Tied With President, And Not Even Running Yet

Despite not even announcing his candidacy, historian Guðni Th. Jóhannesson is tied with incumbent Ólafur Ragnar Grímsson in a new poll.

Kjarninn reports that, according to a new poll taken by the magazine Frjáls verslun, Guðni and Ólafur have almost equal levels of support. If presidential elections were held today, 51.1% said they would vote for Guðni, while 48.9% said they would vote for Ólafur.

The remarkable thing about these results is that Guðni is not even running for president. Not yet anyway, but he has called for a press conference in Kópavogur this Thursday, and only one other Icelander has called upon national attention to announce they were not running.

While those in the capital area were more likely to support Guðni, as opposed to most voters in the countryside supporting Ólafur, Guðni had majority support from every age group with the exception of those over 70.

In addition, the majority of ruling coalition party supporters said they would vote for Ólafur, while most supporters of all other parties chose Guðni.

Presidential elections will be held this June 25.