Few presidential favorites for GOP

WASHINGTON, April 21 (UPI) -- Republican voters in the United States still haven't formed strong opinions about most of their potential presidential candidates, a poll indicates.

The New York Times/CBS News poll released Thursday found that former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee is the only possible Republican candidate viewed favorably by more than half of the GOP electorate, The New York Times reported.

Former Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts drew a 42 percent favorable response while real estate magnate Donald Trump scored a favorable rating from 35 percent of those polled.

With less than a year to go before the Iowa caucuses, it appears many of the likely candidates have a lot of work to do, the polling suggests.

For example, nearly 80 percent of poll respondents said they did not know enough about former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty to say whether they viewed him favorably or unfavorably.

Polling was worse for Gov. Haley Barber of Mississippi with 85 percent of those polled unable to render an opinion.

Only 5 percent of respondents viewed Jon Huntsman, the outgoing U.S. ambassador to China, favorably while more than 90 percent had no opinion.

Rep. Michele Bachmann of Minnesota, Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels, and former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania drew similar responses.

The Times story did not say when the poll was conducted, how many people were polled and what the margin of error was.