Category Archives: Polling

Kasich Falls Into Tie in Ohio Governor’s Race

Ohio Gov. John Kasich has been, possibly until now, performing well in his early re-election bid. A new poll taken for the Ohio Democratic Party, however, suggests the race has tightened to the point of being a virtual tie.

Public Policy Polling (April 14-15; 1,050 registered Ohio voters), surveying for the ODP, finds the governor falling into a tie at 44 percent with Cuyahoga County Executive Ed FitzGerald (D), but the study may be slightly skewed.

Looking at the PPP cross-tabs allows us to glean some key information. Most notably, the poll skews female because women comprise 53 percent of the respondent pool compared to their 51 percent share of the Ohio population at large. Since the female vote tips toward FitzGerald, the overall ballot test is likely distorted by a slight margin.

The poll’s gender segmentation is significant because the divisions here are not as stark as found in most studies of this race and others. Here we find that women break only 45-43 percent in FitzGerald’s favor, far closer than a normal Democrat-Republican split. This should be good news for Gov. Kasich.
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Why You Won’t See Sebelius Running in the Kansas Senate Race

According to the New York Times, unnamed Democrats are floating the name of outgoing Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius as a potential opponent to Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS) later this year. For many reasons, such a move will not happen.

As we know, Sebelius announced earlier in April that she will be leaving her position. President Obama already has appointed a successor, subject to Senate confirmation. She leaves office bearing the brunt of what has gone wrong with the Affordable Care Act implementation, particularly relating to the disastrous registration process on the official healthcare website.

According to the Times analysis, Roberts is viewed as potentially vulnerable. This may be true in the Republican primary, because he faces a spirited challenge from physician Milton Wolf, but it is hardly the case in rock-ribbed Republican Kansas when considering the general election.

Public Policy Polling had already tested Sebelius as a potential opponent to the senator, giving us insight into her strength on the ballot. She has a strong history as a Continue reading >

Dems Hit Tillis in NC Senate Race

It is becoming clear who the Democrats don’t want Sen. Kay Hagan to face in November. The Senate Majority PAC, conducting an independent expenditure operation in the North Carolina Senate race, just unleashed a major attack ad against state House Speaker Thom Tillis (R-Cornelius). This is their second wave of commercials that individually targets Tillis.

The Tar Heel State race is one of the key contests that will likely determine which party captures the Senate majority. Sen. Hagan seeks a second term after defeating then-Sen. Elizabeth Dole (R) in the 2008 general election, but is having a difficult time breaking away from the pack in this campaign. Poll after poll shows the incumbent lagging slightly behind all of her Republican opponents, even though virtually all of them have low name identification. Clearly, a sitting senator trailing candidates such as Heather Grant, an Iraq war veteran and nurse, while only consistently scoring in the low 40 percentile range is cause for concern.

http://youtu.be/SPUY5vv5W-Q
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Weekend Transitions: Wisconsin’s Petri Out; New Hampshire’s Brown In

Veteran Wisconsin Congressman Tom Petri (R-WI-6) originally elected in a 1979 special election, meaning he is ninth in House seniority, joined the long line of retiring House members as the weekend began. Petri formally announced that he will not seek a 19th term in November. The development means that 44 House seats will be open in 2014, in addition to the seven districts that have been filled in special elections since the 113th Congress began.

Last week, conservative state Sen. Glenn Grothman launched a Republican primary challenge to the congressman, and it is unclear whether the intra-party challenge influenced Petri’s decision to retire. Reported to be considering entering the now open Republican primary contest are state Assemblyman Duey Stroebel, Ozaukee County Supervisor Joe Dean, and John Hiller, the former campaign treasurer for Gov. Scott Walker (R).

The 6th District sits between Milwaukee and Green Bay, borders Lake Michigan on the east, and then stretches westward to central Wisconsin. It’s major population centers are the cities of Oshkosh, Sheboygan, Fond du Lac, Manitowoc, and Neenah. Mitt Romney carried the 6th District with 53 percent of the vote in 2012, but in 2008, President Obama nipped John McCain here by a slight 49.4-49.3 percent margin. Petri serves on the Transportation & Infrastructure and Continue reading >

Democrats on the Attack in Iowa and Arkansas

http://youtu.be/e5j8S_YgNZ0

Iowa

In the last week of March, Rep. Bruce Braley (D-IA-1) created controversy when saying in what he thought was a private meeting of sympathetic Texas trial attorneys, that the Democrats losing Iowa and the Senate majority would result in a “farmer from Iowa who hasn’t even been to law school” becoming the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Immediately, two outside organizations went on the attack with ads disparaging the mis-stepping congressman, complete with video of his comments. Now, the drivers at the Senate Majority PAC, obviously Continue reading >

Can Sen. Cochrane Hang Onto His Mississippi Seat?

Cochran Positive Ad

Mississippi polling data is now being released at a fast and furious pace. Earlier in the week, we reported about a NSON Opinion Strategies (April 2; 400 Mississippi Republican primary voters) survey that projected veteran Sen. Thad Cochran to be leading his Republican primary challenger, state Sen. Chris McDaniel, by a rather soft 45-37 percent margin. Yesterday, Harper Polling (April 3-5; 570 Mississippi Republican primary voters) released results that place the senator in much stronger political position.

According to Harper, Cochran’s lead is a Continue reading >

Three New Senate Polls Show Incumbents in Trouble

Mississippi

A new survey testing the Republican primary race between veteran Mississippi Sen. Thad Cochran and state Sen. Chris McDaniel again suggests that this intra-party incumbent challenge is becoming the most serious in the nation.

According to a NSON Opinion Strategies survey (released April 2; 400 likely Mississippi Republican primary voters) conducted for the Tea Party Express and provided to Breitbart News, the senator only maintains a 45-37 percent lead over the Tea Party-backed state legislator. This is consistent with earlier public data.

Sen. Cochran, 76 years of age and in his 42nd year of congressional service, is running for a seventh term. He was the first Republican senator elected in a Deep South state during the modern political era, thus beginning the region’s political realignment trend. He has been under attack from conservative organizations for a period of months. It is already known that those outside groups with people and money, such as the Tea Party Leadership Fund, the Tea Party Express, and the Club for Growth, are planning to expend serious resources to independently support the challenger’s effort.
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Is Hagan the Most Vulnerable Senator in 2014?

Survey USA just released confirming data for Public Policy Polling’s long-term consistent findings about the North Carolina Senate race.

Every month, PPP surveys the Tar Heel State mainly because they are a Raleigh-based company. For more than a year, the survey research firm has been forecasting that first-term Sen. Kay Hagan (D) is positioned in the mid to low 40s, sometimes leading her largely unknown Republican opponents by a point or two, other times trailing them by similar margins.

Now, Survey USA tested the NC electorate and found an almost identical result, thus lending more evidence to support the analysis saying that Sen. Hagan is highly endangered for re-election.

According to S-USA (March 27-31; 1,930 registered North Carolina voters for the job approval question; 1,489 respondents for the ballot test questions; 433 likely Continue reading >

Sen. Walsh’s First Polling Test in Montana; New NH Data

When Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT) announced last April that he would not seek re-election in 2014, it was assumed that freshman at-large Rep. Steve Daines (R) would enter the race to replace the outgoing incumbent and become the strong favorite.

The Democrats’ plan, however, to neutralize the Republican advantage in Montana is a good one. Instead of finishing his final senatorial term, President Obama appointed Baucus as US Ambassador to China, thus allowing Gov. Steve Bullock (D) to install his lieutenant governor, John Walsh, who was already running for the Senate, as the interim replacement. The move gives now-Sen. Walsh, at the very least, abbreviated incumbent stature and is clearly the best political play the Montana Democrats could make.

In federal office since Feb. 7, the new senator has had some time to begin to decrease Daines’ double-digit polling leads. Rasmussen Reports (March 17-18; 750 Continue reading >