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Saturday, April 08, 2006
CA-50: New Datamar Poll
Posted by DavidNYCDatamar (PDF) has a new poll out on CA-50 ("high-propensity" registered voters, March 22-24 in parens):
Francine Busby (D): 39 (36)
Eric Roach (R): 17.5 (11.2)
Brian Bilbray (R): 16.4 (11.7)
Howard Kaloogian: 9.5 (10.6)
Bill Morrow: 6.8 (4.8)
Alan Uke: 4.3 (3)
Other: 6.3 (18)
(MoE: ±3.03%)
A few important things:
1) Datamar uses an automated call system. Some times this methodology works well (SurveyUSA) and sometimes it doesn't (Rasmussen). The verdict is still out on Datamar.
2) The sample is skewed very Republican: 55R-33D-9I. Voter registration in the district is 44R-30D. The district voted 55-44 for Bush. What's more, with half of all absentee ballots sent in, the current breakdown so far is 46R-37D-14I. (I have those numbers directly from the campaign.) So basically, I ain't buyin' a 22-point GOP advantage.
3) Perhaps most importantly, the NRCC would not parachute in with an emergency $360,000 ad buy if they thought Busby was going to get 39% on Tuesday. The only reason to hit the panic button this early is if you think Busby can wrap it all up with 50% in round one. The guys at the NRCC aren't idiots - remember how they bailed Jean Schmidt's ass out at the last minute? This time, though, we've got a stronger candidate, a former Congressman in jail and the national wind at our backs.
Francine's campaign is now all about GOTV. If you're anywhere near the San Diego area at all, please consider volunteering. We may just have a chance to drive a serious nail into the GOP coffin right here.
UPDATE: Chris makes a good observation. When you multiply candidate preference (as expressed in the SUSA and Datamar polls) by the partisan breakdown of the absentee ballots, Busby clocks in at 44%. However (and this is a big however), Republicans generally seem to do better at turning out the early vote. This happened in both the CA-48 special and the TX-28 primary. (Okay, technically Cuellar wasn't a Republican. But I still think the analogy holds.) So Busby may indeed get closer to 50%. Bowers is thinking 47%, but I'm not making any predictions.
Posted at 12:21 AM in 2006 Elections - House | Technorati
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Comments
Curious does anyone know if Chris Young has given up his run for CA-50 i'm worried he may take a few votes away from Busby..
Posted by: D in FL. ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.swingstateproject.com/nav-commenters.gif)
at April 8, 2006 01:51 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Actually Chris Young is a she. And she still seems to be running, according to her website. I haven't read anything to the contrary yet.
Hopefully she won't get enough votes to cost Busby the win...
Posted by: bogun at April 8, 2006 04:17 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
better candidate
I am sorry Francine Busby is not a better Candidate than Paul Hackett.
Posted by: Democraticavenger at April 8, 2006 06:15 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
better candidate
I am sorry Francine Busby is not a better Candidate than Paul Hackett.
He didn't say better, he said stronger. And I'm not sure she is stronger but she certainly has some advantages that Hackett didn't have. Namely, she has already been elected to another (albeit minor) office, she has run for the seat before, she has a campaign staff who has done this before, she has a big cash advantage, and she doesn't have a tendency to damage herself by shooting her mouth off.
Posted by: Jay at April 8, 2006 07:29 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Hackett also was elected to a minor office. She does have a money edge. Paul Hackett had not at this point said anything to off the coff.
Posted by: Democraticavenger at April 8, 2006 09:23 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Another advantage Busby had is CA's system vs Ohio's. Hackett was only running against one person so she got all the GOP support. Also, although this is a GOP district, its not nearly as bad as OH-02.
Posted by: safi at April 8, 2006 11:17 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Busby has raised far more money than Hackett ever did ($1.3M to 860K). Moreover, that money didn't come in one final spurt - she's raised consistently over time, allowing her to build up slowly and smartly. Raising a lot of money all at the very end is preferable to not raising any at all, but it's not as effective as having raised all along. (Think Ciro Rodriguez.)
Also, Busby's been campaigning for this seat for over two years, so she's better-known in the district. Remember, she ran and lost against the Dukestir in 2004 - she's been working every minute since then. And I agree with Jay that, from all I can tell, she has a much more experienced staff.
All that said, this wasn't a post about Hackett vs. Busby. Even if you think Hackett was the superior candidate, there are many other inherent factors that make CA-50 a much more likely pickup than OH-02 ever was.
Posted by: DavidNYC at April 8, 2006 01:58 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Googled Datamar to find out whether or not they are connected to the Repub Party. Per this link there is reference that they are:
http://www.voiceofsandiego.org/site/pp.asp?c=euLTJbMUKvH&b=1270811
I looked at the ethnic stats of the District compared with their polling sample and came up with the following:
District 50 Datamar Sample
Hispanic 18.8% 6.0%
Asian 10.3% 5.1%
Black 1.8% 0.8%
Total 30.9% 11.9%
Not only is it skewed on the party registration, it is very skewed ethnically, and guess how those groups vote.
Agree with your take David, the RNCC is dumping money into this because they are scared. I still think the good news is, that if Busby does not hit 50%, the runoff will be on the same date as the Statewide Primary, and the big contests are on the Dem side, this will act as a huge plus.
Posted by: Predictor at April 8, 2006 02:11 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Predictor, for a useful comparison, you really need the ethnic breakdown for voters in the district, not the population as a whole. It's likely that ethnic groups differ significantly in the percentage that vote, or even in the percentage that are eligible to vote (because of age, citizenship, or other factors). Of course if minority groups are voting less, that's all the more reason for Democrats to do GOTV among them, but a poll that's supposed to reflect likely voters shouldn't be expected to have the same ethnic makeup as the district in general.
Posted by: KCinDC at April 8, 2006 06:26 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Thanks, I am aware of that KCinDC. Even if you cut those numbers in half (minority pop.), they did not poll accurately as far as I'm concerned, and I'd say it's their methodology of contact during polling.
In California we have a "Do Not Call" Law, and a huge percentage of the population here have put themselves on that anti-solicitation list (something like 75%) They cannot be legally contacted by phone, nor are they (Datamar) contacting anyone with a cell phone # from my understanding.
I do know from past experience here that the turnout in the Asian community is relatively higher than average. Hispanic tends to be a little lower than average.
SS Calif does not have an ethnic breakdown of voter roles.
Posted by: Predictor at April 8, 2006 06:38 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Good point, KC. Looking at CA 2004 presidential exit polls, the ethnic breakdown across the state was:
White 65%
African-American 6%
Latino 21%
Asian 4%
Other 4%
However, the most recent census data for CA looks like this:
White 59.5%
Black or African American 6.7%
American Indian and Alaska Native 1.0%
Asian persons 10.9%
Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander 0.3%
Persons reporting some other race 16.8%
Persons reporting two or more races 4.7%
White persons, not of Hispanic/Latino origin 46.7%
Persons of Hispanic or Latino origin 32.4%
The difficulty in doing a direct comparison is that the census Hispanic/Latino category is not a "race" - you can be Hispanic and be of any race. Nonetheless, it's not much of a surprise that certain ethnic groups vote in smaller percentages than their proportion of the population as a whole.
Posted by: DavidNYC at April 8, 2006 06:44 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Like I said, even if you cut it in half (census figures) 6% Hispanic/Asian/Black in that District is not representative.
Posted by: Predictor at April 8, 2006 06:59 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Change 6% to 11.9%.
BTW, the Asian turnout in SF in 2004 was around 85%.
Posted by: Predictor at April 8, 2006 07:02 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Here's a link to a study done by Field on 2/4/06 regarding demographics and voting trends in California.
Between 1998 & 2005 the percentage Hispanic vote has increased from 16% to 19%, Asian vote from 6% to 8%. Black vote flatlined at 6%.
http://field.com/fieldpollonline/subscribers/CaliforniaMegatrends.pdf
Posted by: Predictor at April 8, 2006 08:55 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
I think the most overlooked part of this poll is the evidence that Roach (perfect Republican name) has overtaken Bilbray on the Republican side of the race. I live in Oceanside just a wee bit out side of CA 50 and the word around here is that Bilbray is by far the strongest of the Republican candidates in part because he is more moderate. If Roach beats him in this round it could be good news for Busby. A more conservative candidate makes it easier for Busby to pull moderate Republican votes.
Posted by: francis at April 8, 2006 11:25 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
Datamar first appeared on the polling scene with their polls regarding the San Diego mayoral race this last year. As I recall off the top of my head, their primary polling last summer gave the Democratic candidate less support than she had in the primary. I also recall that they were identified then as having a Republican link.
I read the Datamar report, and I have problems with the methodology for selecting respondents. The report says that they only accepted respondents that had voted in the 2004 primary AND general AND the 2002 primary AND general. I know that other polling outfits often determine respondents' propensities to vote by whether they have voted in 2004 AND/OR 2002. Conservative voters are more likely to vote in EVERY election than liberal voters, a sad but true fact. So I believe that Datamar's sample is skewed to be more conservative than Tuesday's voting population because of how they select their respondents.
SurveyUSA's results feel more correct (knock on wood!), and I think that the Busby campaign's reports buttress it and show even more movement.
Lacking information about the ethnic breakdown of voting behavior for this district, it's anybody's guess whether there is a skew or not. But in regards to the Asian population in this district, I know for a fact that the bulk of the asian population in this district is Filipino, a group with low voter participation because of either lacking citizenship or because of lackluster participation. And of those who do actively vote, many vote Republican. While I don't know if ethnic groups are represented correctly according to their numbers, the description of their preferences in this poll does fit with past trends.
Posted by: phonatic at April 9, 2006 12:15 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
francis: Roach more conservative, you better believe it, he's a Mormon.
Here's a good article on the race and the candidates:
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/politics/50thdistrict/20060410-9999-1m10campaign.html
Posted by: Predictor at April 10, 2006 05:05 PM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment
The new Data Mar is great, Busby up two everyone else tralling lost points and eight point over Republican sampling,and this just the AB's we can win this thing.
Posted by: Democraticavenger at April 11, 2006 12:44 AM | Permalink | Edit Comment | Delete Comment