Congressman David Cicilline’s job approval numbers in the 1st Congressional District are much worse than those of his fellow Democrats, U.S. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse and President Obama.

But there may be a silver lining for Cicilline in our new WPRI 12 poll – he’ll be sharing the ballot with Obama and Whitehouse in November 2012, so their presence on the ticket could give him a needed boost.

The survey of 300 registered voters by Fleming & Associates was conducted May 13-15 and has a 5.7% margin of error. Here’s how they rated the job performance of the three Democrats:

• Obama: 53% positive / 46% negative / 1% don’t know
• Whitehouse: 46% positive / 47% negative / 7% don’t know
• Cicilline: 23% positive / 63% negative / 14% don’t know

In our survey, “positive” means a voter described the politician’s job performance as “excellent” or “good,” while negative means he or she described it as “fair” or “poor.”

Tim White and I have more – including extended analysis from our political analyst Joe Fleming – in our new story on WPRI.com. Joe will also be taking about the poll this weekend on WPRI 12′s “Newsmakers” along with Tim, WRNI’s Ian Donnis and Scott MacKay, and yours truly.

You can also see the poll results for Cicilline when he goes head-to-head against his two potential Republican opponents here, and check out complete poll results here.