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GOP Presidential Contender Herman Cain Takes Lead In Second Poll

<p>Business executive Herman Cain, left, and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney during a debate Tuesday (Oct. 11, 2011) in New Hampshire. </p>
Scott Eells
/
AP

Business executive Herman Cain, left, and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney during a debate Tuesday (Oct. 11, 2011) in New Hampshire.

"Fueled by Tea Party supporters, conservatives and high-interest GOP primary voters, former Godfather's Pizza CEO Herman Cain now leads the race for the Republican presidential nomination, according to the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll," NBC News deputy political director Mark Murry reports.

He says that: "Cain checks in as the first choice of 27 percent of Republican voters in the poll, followed by former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney at 23 percent and Perry at 16 percent. After those three, it's Texas Rep. Ron Paul at 11 percent, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich at 8 percent, Bachmann at 5 percent and former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman at 3 percent."

The survey of 336 voters who say they plan to vote in Republican primaries has a margin of error on each result of +/- 5.35 percentage points.

This marks the second poll this week showing Cain in the lead. As our colleague Frank James reported on It's All Politics, "a new poll from Public Policy Polling has the one-time Godfather's Pizza CEO leading Mitt Romney by eight percentage points, 30 percent to 22 percent." That survey was of 484 "usual Republican primary voters" and has a margin of error of +/- 4.5 points.

All the usual caveats apply: It's still very early in the race; a lot will happen between now and the primaries; and the polls have relatively large margins of error.

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Mark Memmott is NPR's supervising senior editor for Standards & Practices. In that role, he's a resource for NPR's journalists – helping them raise the right questions as they do their work and uphold the organization's standards.