Rick Scott Edges Charlie Crist, Adrian Wyllie Factors in New Poll

Quinnipiac University released a poll on Wednesday morning showing the Florida gubernatorial contest remains very close. Gov. Rick Scott leads with 44 percent followed by former Gov. Charlie Crist, the Democratic candidate, with 42 percent. Libertarian Adrian Wyllie continues to be a factor, taking 8 percent in the poll. Other candidates garner 1 percent while 5 percent of voters are undecided.

When Wyllie is taken out of the race, Scott continues to lead with 46 percent and Crist gets 44 percent in that scenario.

Peter Brown, the assistant director of the Quinnipiac University poll, said voters backing Wyllie and independents -- who break 44 percent for Scott, 37 percent for Crist and 11 percent for Wyllie -- will determine the race.

"The two voter groups that will tell the tale of the election are independent voters and those who are backing Libertarian candidate Adrian Wyllie, said Brown on Wednesday. Gov. Rick Scott and former Gov. Charlie Crist are doing about the same with their respective party bases and former Republican Crist is not having any trouble being accepted by members of his new party.

"Wyllie voters are the bigger unknown because there is little way of predicting if they will stay with the third-party challenger or decide to switch to Scott or Crist in order to be with a winner," Brown added. "At this point, neither major-party candidate is doing markedly better as a second choice of Wyllie voters. It is also worth considering that there is a consensus that negative campaigning tends to be a turnoff more to the very people who seem to hold the keys to the kingdom -- independents and third-party voters."

The poll of 991 likely voters was taken from Sept. 17-22 and had a margin of error of +/- 3.1 percent.