Debbie Wasserman Schultz vs. Allen West Would Be Statistical Tie: Poll

What If.

It would be a dream for political junkies: U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz vs. former U.S. Rep. Allen West for Florida's U.S. Senate seat in 2016.

Voters would have a clear contest since the longtime political foes don't see eye-to-eye on anything.

And a new Public Policy Polling Survey out Thursday shows such a hypothetical contest would be a toss-up.

Wasserman Schultz, the Weston congresswoman who's chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee, would get 44 percent of the vote.

West, the tea party Republican who lived in Plantation for most of his single term in Congress before moving to Palm Beach Gardens, would get 40 percent.

That's close enough to be a statistical tie. The margin of error is plus or minus 4.1 percentage points in the survey of 579 Florida voters from Sept. 27-29.

The seat in question is held by freshman U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., who might be running for president in 2016.

If he's not, PPP found, he holds a narrow lead over Wasserman Schultz. Rubio would beat her 46 percent to 43 percent, another statistical tie.

Polls so far in advance don't show much besides name recognition and how polarizing certain figures are.

Florida voters' opinions of Rubio are evenly divided, with 43 percent approving and 45 percent disapproving.

Based on their unfriendly history, a Wasserman Schultz-West contest would be a doozy.

She campaigned against him in 2010. He later criticized her as "the most vile, unprofessional and despicable member of the U.S. House of Representatives. ... You have proven repeatedly that you are not a lady." He lost his bid for a second term last year.

Would you like to see Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Allen West run against each other? Online poll at SunSentinel.com/BrowardPolitics.

aman@tribune.com, 954-356-4550 ___

(c)2013 the Sun Sentinel (Fort Lauderdale, Fla.)

Visit the Sun Sentinel (Fort Lauderdale, Fla.) at www.sun-sentinel.com

Distributed by MCT Information Services

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