Rasmussen: Obama maintains lead in Minnesota

Barack Obama leads John McCain by a 52-45 margin in Minnesota, according to a Rassmussen Reports poll released this afternoon. The contest is largely unchanged from a month ago, when the polling firm showed the Democratic with an eight-point lead.

Rasmussen also found that Obama is viewed favorably by 60 percent of voters, compared with 40 percent who see him unfavorably. The favorable-unfavorable split for McCain is 53-47. The economy clearly has become the dominant issue of the campaign. Of those surveyed, 44 percent picked it as their top issue, with no other topic reaching 20 percent. Only 5 percent of voters perceive the current economy as good or excellent, and a whopping 87 percent believe it will continue to get worse.

The poll of 500 likely voters has a margin of error of +/- 4.5 percent.