Udall is losing … or not
Posted by Richard on September 18, 2014
The latest Quinnipiac poll of likely Colorado voters must have Republicans cheering. GOP challenger Cory Gardner leads Sen. Mark Udall by 8 points, 48-40%. That’s well outside the 2.8% margin of error. Independent Steve Shogan, who recently began running TV ads, gets 8%. With Shogan out of the race, Gardner’s lead jumps to 10 points (63% of Shogan supporters say they may change their mind, and they prefer Gardner as their second choice by 10 points).
But wait. Three other recent polls have significantly different results:
- The Suffolk/USA TODAY poll gives Udall a 1-point lead, 43-42%, well within its 4.4% margin of error.
- The Myers/Project New America poll has Udall leading 48-46%, within its 2.7% margin of error. PNA is a “progressive” political consulting firm. (By the way, if you want a good laugh, open their press release (PDF) for this poll, scroll to the bottom, and check out where the link to www.projectnewamerica.com really goes.)
- The SurveyUSA/Denver Post poll (9/8-9/10) shows Udall leading 46-42%, with a 3.9% margin of error.
Three of the polls show Udall with significantly higher negatives (from 47-50%) than Gardner (from 36-42%). Even Myers has Udall’s negatives slightly higher at 43% versus Gardner’s 39%. This surprises me, considering that I’m seeing about a bazillion highly negative anti-Gardner ads a day.
According to the Secretary of State’s August voter registration numbers (PDF), active voters’ party affiliation is approximately 35% Independent, 33% Republican, and 31% Democrat. The Suffolk sample mirrors that almost exactly. The other three slightly undersample Independents. Quinnipiac slightly oversamples Republicans, and the other two slightly oversample Democrats.
Of course, turnout is likely to be more important than the party affiliation percentages. Today, most analysts see GOP voters nationwide as more energized/engaged. But the leadership of the stupid party is certainly capable of destroying that advantage.
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