Toronto mayoral race is Rob Ford's to lose, poll of decided voters says

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Rob Ford has taken a commanding 24-point lead in the mayoral race, according to a new poll that reveals the Etobicoke councillor has won over voters of every political stripe and postal code, including downtowners.

With only five weeks to go until election day, Mr. Ford has the backing of 45.8 per cent of decided voters, while former front-runner George Smitherman has the support of 21.3 per cent.

Joe Pantalone (16.8 per cent), Rocco Rossi (9.7 per cent) and Sarah Thomson (6.4 per cent) round out the top-five contenders, according to a Nanos Research telephone poll of 1,021 Torontonians conducted between Sept. 14 and Sept. 16.

"As of today, this election is about Rob Ford and whether he has what it takes to be mayor," said Nik Nanos, the president and chief executive officer of Nanos Research. "This changes the dynamic significantly."

The old dynamic was a contest between Mr. Ford and his right-leaning suburban base and Mr. Smitherman and his left-leaning downtown supporters. But the poll turns that narrative on its head: It finds Mr. Ford is actually leading the former provincial deputy premier in the old City of Toronto with the support of 37.2 per cent of decided voters compared to 30.3 per cent for Mr. Smitherman and 19.5 per cent for Mr. Pantalone, the deputy mayor and torchbearer for David Miller.

In fact, Mr. Ford is the first choice of voters in every part of the megacity.

He is also surprisingly popular among decided electors, who normally cast ballots for the Liberals and New Democrats. Mr. Ford is nipping at Mr. Smitherman's heels among Liberals - he has the support of 34.6 per cent compared to 36.4 per cent for the former Liberal cabinet minister - and he's tied with Mr. Pantalone among New Democrats at 30.1 per cent.

Mr. Ford is the first choice of 61.9 per cent of Conservatives and 49.3 per cent of non-aligned voters.

The number of undecided voters has dropped sharply since Nanos conducted its last exclusive poll for The Globe and Mail/CTV/CP24 in June, down to 25 per cent from 38.9 per cent. But even if undecided voters are factored in, Mr. Ford still has more than twice the support of Mr. Smitherman - 34.4 per cent to 16 per cent. That's a dramatic change from June, when Mr. Ford's lead over Mr. Smitherman was within the poll's margin of error.

Meanwhile, the four candidates trailing Mr. Ford have barely seen their numbers budge.

With undecided voters included, Mr. Smitherman was at 15.9-per-cent support in June. He's at 16 per cent now. Mr. Pantalone has inched up 2 1/2 points, from 10.1 per cent in June to 12.6 per cent now. Mr. Rossi was at 9 per cent and is now at 7.2 per cent.

Ms. Thomson's support has dropped slightly, from 5.8 per cent in June to 4.8 per cent.

The upshot is that most newly decided voters are backing Mr. Ford.

"They trust me. That's what it comes down to," Mr. Ford said. "People come up to me and say, 'I trust you with my money.' " Mr. Ford has widened his lead despite making just one policy announcement since the high season of campaigning kicked off on Labour Day. While he unveiled a transit plan on YouTube that was roundly panned as unrealistic and unaffordable, Mr. Smitherman and Mr. Rossi put their campaigns into overdrive, holding news conferences daily.

Mr. Smitherman called the poll's findings "humbling." He said he intends to devote the rest of the campaign to making clear the "stark" contrast in values between himself and the front-runner. "Toronto's motto is diversity our strength," he said. "If Rob Ford is elected mayor, we'd have to change our motto. I think that's pretty startling."

Mr. Pantalone is the only candidate other than Mr. Ford who saw his share of the vote increase since June, albeit within the poll's margin of error, which is 3.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

"Clearly, Smitherman isn't up to the job of taking on Ford," said John Laschinger, Mr. Pantalone's campaign manager. "I think there's probably two people happy about this poll. Rob Ford is one and Joe Pantalone is the other."

Mr. Rossi's new campaign manager insisted his candidate is also well-positioned to take on Mr. Ford.

"The greatest potential is for Rocco Rossi because - according to the tracking we've done - he's everybody's second choice," Bernie Morton said.

Still, Mr. Nanos suggested Mr. Ford will win the Oct. 25 election unless two things happen: the controversial councillor self-implodes and a clear alternative pulls away from the pack.

"Otherwise, Ford will have the conservative and the non-aligned universes locked up and the rest will be fighting for political table scraps."