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April 18, 2014 01:11 PM UTC

GOP American Crossroads Poll Shows Udall Up By 2 Points

  • 25 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols
Mark Udall, Cory Gardner.
Mark Udall, Cory Gardner.

The conservative Daily Caller reports on a new poll conducted for Republican-aligned SuperPAC American Crossroads on the Colorado U.S. Senate race:

Incumbent Colorado Democratic Sen. Mark Udall has a slim lead over his challenger, Republican Rep. Cory Gardner, according to a new poll from American Crossroads.

Forty-five percent of those polled said they would vote for Udall, compared to 43 percent for Gardner. Twelve percent of respondents aren’t sure who they will vote for.

Udall’s lead is well within the poll’s 4.35 percent margin of error, meaning that the contest remains a dead heat.

In terms of favorability, voters’ opinion of Udall is almost evenly split, with 41 percent saying they have a favorable opinion of him to 42 percent unfavorable.

Their opinion of Gardner, however, is more clearly divided, with 38 percent unfavorable to 30 percent favorable. But 32 percent aren’t sure.

Here's the memo from Harper Polling.

This conservative leaning poll has a fairly high margin of error at 4.35%, and uses automated methodology that we really don't think is as accurate as live interviews. Despite these caveats, it's interesting that a month of high-volume attacks on incumbent Democratic Sen. Mark Udall do not appear to have moved the needle against him at all–Udall still polls narrowly ahead of challenger Cory Gardner. We'll want to see more polling to establish that clearly, but as a Republican strategist, you can't look at unchanged polls after shoveling money into attack ads against Udall over "Obamacare" for a month and feel good about it. If that's right, Americans for Prosperity and friends just wasted a pile of Koch Brothers money.

Comments

25 thoughts on “GOP American Crossroads Poll Shows Udall Up By 2 Points

  1. I'm going to predict, here and now, that 2014 elections will prove to be very similar to 2012's results: The usual-suspect right-wing plutocrats and oligarchs will funnel unholy amounts of dirty money to their despicable, craven water carriers up and down the GOP ranks, only to see pathetically anemic returns on their evil investments.

    People are becoming increasingly hip (not as quickly as we'd prefer, of course) to the GOP's patented every-two-years bullshit eruptions and lie-filled smear campaigns. Diminishing returns began setting in long ago, as did the moral decay among the Gaseous Old Prostitutes themselves.

  2. The number I love most is 32.

    When people get to know who Gardner is they are going to hate his Koch brothers teabagging ass.

  3. The methodology of this poll has a lot of weaknesses beyond what COPols discussed in the OP. I am really not sure that any information of value can be derived from it. 

    But the full numbers do have some interesting snapshots. 

    For one thing, the number of self-identified "conservatives" outnumbered the "liberals" by 35-20. 

    And in the question of generic Republican vs Democrat for US Senate, the response was 47-43 in favor of the generic Republican. This shows a significant lean to the right. Which makes Udall's lead more impressive (and likely underestimated). 

    The poll asks several question about the level of approval of Udall as Senator, Obama as President, and of the ACA, but never asks any similar questions about Gardner's performance in Congress or of the GOP led US House in general. 

    Then, after all that, they ask:

    Tell me if you agree or disagree with the following statement: things have gotten so bad in Washington that we need to send a message by voting out every incumbent, regardless of their party and record? 

    And even with all the obvious priming present in the earlier questions, the respondants still resist this question, 47% said no, 42% said yes, and an inexplicable 12% was "not sure" about a question that is a really easy yes or no. Those 12% should be counted amoung the "NOs" on that question because if they had strong feeling about it, htey would have said yes. 

    Anti-incumbency is not going to defeat Udall. And neither is Obamacare. The people want it fixed, not repealed, so the majority of the 61% of respondants who said that the issue would influence their vote are going to vote against someone who advocates for repeal, as Gardner does. 

     

     

    1. Presidents for the last 100 years (since Teddy Roosevelt) have struggled to provide health care for Americans (because a healthy workforce leads to more prosperity for all).  Now, through the perserverance of Barack Obama, overcoming historic opposition and obstruction, we finally have achieved that century-old dream.

      And the one note Republican Marching Band and their billionaire benefactors can only campaign on the promise that if elected, they'll take it away, wishing to return to the good old days of a Dickensian Dystopia with the 1% industrial barons, 99% peasants, and no middle class to speak of.

      Good luck with that!

  4. Still, Udall has his work cut out for him.  The poll shows a virtual tie; this after anti-Gardner commercials and the whole flip flop on personhood.  I think that the date the poll was conducted should be part of the report.  Udall is the incumbent and Gardner was "supposedly" unknown out of his district.

      1. You mean you don't buy dust puppy's prediction of a tsunami of Dem landslides? Me neither and don't think Udall will win big but do believe he'll win. For most voters the election isn't a blip on the screen yet. Most never heard of  Gardner, much less about his flip flops. That's what high undecideds mean. They mean "who?"  There will be plenty of effective Udall ads, both from the campaign and outside support groups, and plenty of Udall GOTV when we get into the real election season.  The guy's been around the block a few times. His team knows how it's done.

        1. Gardner has won in a deep red district like Tancredo or Lamborn.  He has no experience in campaigning for the moderate vote much less a record of achievement in his two terms as a Congressman.  He doesn't know how to win a close race or promote policies that benefit all Americans.

      1. In addition, I think the Obama administration was horribly incompetent in their run out of the ACA. And I listen to Republicans and try to see their side of the argument. A well done ad on that topic would have me going "hell yes." Yet that was so badly done it couldn't even reach me.

        My worry is they might come up with some effective ads. That would hurt Senator Udall.

    1. The other thing about these ads, in a metaphorical way, is my perception that you can only twist the English language so far until it starts to shreik in syntactic pain and the mendacity becomes a howl that even the dullest of observers cannot miss.

      I feel a tide of recognition starting to swell. My acquaintences on the right no longer lecture me with the Obama-hating fervor they once wielded. They have been misled and lied to so many times, they are finally beginning to understand the depth and breadth of their betrayal by the rich and mighty.

      I am guessing here, but in the long run, this bullshit RE the functionally illiterate rancher in Nevada who doesn't "recognize the existence of the federal government", is going to wound Fox News and the rightie noise machine. To what degree RTBS.  

      1. Syntactic pain gave me my first good laugh of the day, Duke. And all that the ads the Koch-heads have been running prove is that, once again, the Republicans have gone just that much too far. Keep feeding them rope, they'll hang themselves with it

  5. This poll is close relative to the one I posted on the Open Thread the other day showing Romanoff maintaining a lead against Coffman.

    Harper is a GOP firm, and the poll sample leans Republican. Also, as the Guvs point out, this is a robocall, and Harper unlike PPP doesn't attempt to compensate for the growing cell phone only population. The poll is likely a bit on the conservative side as a result.

    Gardner's approval numbers show that 2/3 of the electorate already know who he is and are applying that negative view of Congress, the House, House Republicans, and the Tea Party against him. As they get involved, I suspect the remaining 32 percent will fall along the same lines.

    Udall being one point underwater is not too bad considering the overall feelings about Congress. He's still got a tough race ahead of him, but I suspect his ratings will go up now that Obamacare sign-ups are completed for the year. He might still be vulerable to ACA attacks if rates go up significantly next year, but it is expected that rate increases based on this year's signups will be comparatively modest.

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