Poll: Medina Up; Perry, Hutchison Down

DALLAS - Rick Perry still holds a double-digit lead over Kay Bailey Hutchison on the Republican side of the race for Texas Governor, according to a new Rasmussen Reports poll in conjunction with the FOX Television Stations Group.

There's also good news in the poll for Debra Medina, the third major GOP candidate for Governor, who muscled her way into last Thursday's debate.

The poll of 831 likely Republican voters showed Perry with 43 percent, Hutchison with 33 percent, and Medina at 12 percent.

Compared to the poll taken by Rasmussen Reports back in November, Medina is up 8 percentage points, while Perry is down 3 points, and Hutchison lost two.  The number of undecided voters went down to 11 percent from 14 percent in November 2009.

Poll results are especially valuable to Medina as she tries to justify a place in the second GOP debate, to be held January 29th.  Belo Corp., which will host the debate, lists a 15 percent poll threshold as one of its criteria for whether or not to exclude a candidate from the debate.