Lot’s of internal polls to digest in recent days. Let’s kill ’em all in one post.
FL-13:
Public Opinion Strategies for the NRCC (8/23-24, likely voters, July in parens and 3/5-6 in brackets):
Christine Jennings (D): 30 (30) [37]
Vern Buchanan (R-inc): 48 (44) [53]
(MoE: ±4.9%)
Woof. That’s not a spread that I like to see, but at least Buchanan is under 50%. After being hit by a new lawsuit every week for the past month and a half (or so) on allegations of consumer fraud and illegal campaign fundraising, Buchanan’s camp released this poll to ensure folks that everything is hunky-dory. We haven’t seen numbers from this race from any other source than Buchanan’s campaign, so I’m inclined to believe these ballpark figures. However, with so many legal headaches, I wouldn’t say that Buchanan is out of the woods yet.
FL-21:
Hill Research Associates for Lincoln Diaz-Balart (6/19-22, likely voters):
Raul Martinez (D): 36
Lincoln Diaz-Balart (R-inc): 48
(MoE: ±4.9%)
Diaz-Balart pumped out this somewhat moldy poll in an attempt to refute a recent SUSA poll showing Martinez leading D-B the Lesser by two. Given that a Bendixen poll of this race from June showed Martinez trailing only by four points, I’m inclined to believe that the numbers are much tighter than Diaz-Balart’s cherry-picked poll suggests.
IL-18:
Public Opinion Strategies for Aaron Schock (8/18-20, likely voters):
Colleen Callahan (D): 27
Aaron Schock (R): 56
Sheldon Schafer (G): 2
(MoE: ±4.9%)
Ugh. Crazy Aaron Schock doesn’t deserve this.
PA-10:
Momentum Analysis for Christopher Carney (8/19-21, likely voters):
Christopher Carney (D-inc): 54
Chris Hackett (R-inc): 27
(MoE: ±4.9%)
Yeah, I dunno, dudes. SurveyUSA also recently tested this R+8 district, and found Carney only holding a 49-45 lead. I’m a little more inclined to believe that this race is closer to SUSA’s estimate than Carney’s poll, but I still feel pretty good about his chances.
FL-13 — after the nasty, drawn-out court case, there’s no way Jennings is going to win this time.
IL-18 — I don’t think Colleen Callahan has done a single noteworthy thing in her campaign; I haven’t heard anything out of that district since she replaced whatshisname on the ballot.
FL-13 Unless the Buchanan-forced donations-gate materializes, Jennings isn’t going to win this one. And If she would have jsut gone quietly in 2006 (or at least didn’t draw it out as much as she did,) she would be in a much better position right now.
FL-21 Maybe that’s what the race looked like in June, but it’s September, baby, and this one’s all tied up.
IL-18 Our recruitment was horrible here. Even Versace would be in a better position than Callahan. this poll is probably accurate.
PA-10 Interestingly, I’m kindof friends with Chris Carney’s nephew. I’m hoping his poll is more accurate than the SUSA poll, but I doubt it.
FL-13: Why do people finally now start coming out of the woodwork and concluding that a long and drawnout recount process does tend to alienate voters?
FL-21: What portion of people recognize Raul Martinez in that poll?
IL-18: Why doesn’t Callahan do something about this Schocking idiot?
PA-10: This is the one I’m happy about.
like Carney’s, there are more than 27% Yellow Dog Republicans. I also think SUSA’s poll pushed swing voters too much. I doubt there are only 6% of the electorate undecided. If I had to peg this race, I’d guess Carney is around 45-46% and Hacket is around 40% now.
Even with Obama at the top of the ticket and his near-certainty of carrying his home state by a huge margin, is there even a slight chance of Ms. Callahan pulling off an upset? Can a miracle happen there in the 18th district?
FL-13: I guess the residents of the district got so tired of Jennings’ continued crusade two years ago into the legality of her loss, with all those rants with her lawyers in tow, that they’re sticking with the Republican this time.
FL-21: This one is totally fake.
IL-18: Apparently youth and crazy foreign policy statements have not hurt the young Mr. Schock’s chances. Too bad, I actually thought this would be an easy Democrat pickup.
PA-10: I saw this Carney internal poll already as well. Not really sure what to make of this.
Except for maybe FL-13. If people just want Jennings to GTFO, this is possible. But still, it’s a relatively close district at R+3, and Jennings was able to win/fall 369 votes short last time, so I’d imagine that she should at least by close to or over 40%.
As for the others, maybe the incumbents’ reelect numbers are accurate, but all of them seem to be seriously suppressing their challengers’ percentages. These all seem like polls for propaganda purposes, not informational purposes.
SUSA >>> internal polls
Sorry but I’ll take SUSA’s great track record over some of these absurd internal polls anyday.
POS is a solid firm but I reckon they have a bad poll on their hands. Or they played a little trick to suppress Jennings’ FR.
TIMING:
The coastal counties of this district have heavy concentrations of snowbirds, largely from the Midwest and an unusually high cluster of folks from Mass. Where are a good number of these folks in August? Up north.
On top of this, August polling is notoriously inaccurate generally. You have around 1/4 to 1/3 of likely voters off on vacation in any given week of August.
NAME REC:
You’re telling me Jennings name rec has fallen after the close call in 2006 and the protracted court fight? from the low 80s to high 60s? Something is off here.
WEIGHTING BY COUNTY:
My suspicion is the sample was drawn by some method other than proportionately by county. They probably ended up drawing more Democrats from the interior counties (Hardee and Desoto) than they should and shorted Sarasota, which would skew the Dems more conservative and likely to vote for Buchanan.
We have no breakdown available of the D/R/I percentages. Big chunk of indies in this district, too.
WEATHER:
Always a problem in hurricane season polling in Florida… but wasn’t there a storm rolling through the area on the 23rd and 24th? It’s gonna skew your sample when folks are boarding up.
THE TRICK:
They also might have measured the vote preference at least twice… the clean read at the start and after the positive/negative statements section. They might have released the final measure after tossing out their oppo to see how it tests. That is the beauty of inernals. You can get your clean data for strategic planning then something to release to hurt the opponent.
Anyway, I reckon Buchanan is up but he is not up any 18. And he is still below 50 at a time when a good chunk of the Dem-leaning snowbirds are still up north.
This poll is not a clean read. Again, how could her name rec have fallen after all the pub and two campaigns? If we had the demos we could pick this apart… which is why they were not made available.
Look at it from the Buchanan campaign’s perspective. They have a boatload of money. Their pre-Labor Day dip poorly and got bad numbers. They made some lemonade out of the lemons by dropping this bad poll showing an 18-point lead to suppress Jennings’ FR and trick the DCCC into lokking elsewhere.
This is a +3 GOP district… but these are old school GOP, country clubbers rather than born-agains. Pretty moderate bunch open to persuasion.
I agree with earlier posts that Jennings should have dropped the fighting over 2006 earlier, but the logic that this is what dragged her down falls apart when we’re citing a poll showing her name rec falling like a rock.
And do not forget the fissure between the country clubbers around Sarasota and the more hardcore wingers in the interior counties is what got Jennings so close last time. And the wounds linger and bad blood is still out there.
No way Buchanan is up 18.