Good grief. Following all of these conflicting poll results is like shoveling the sidewalk while it's still snowing. #copolitics #COSen
— Vic Vela (@VicVela1) September 17, 2014
UPDATE: Or…maybe Hickenlooper is up by 2 points? After a morning of polling flurries, we'd say we're pretty well back to where we ended the day yesterday.
—
Earlier today, Quinnipiac University released polling results from the Colorado Governor's race that had Republican Bob Beauprez leading Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper by a 10-point margin. We were skeptical of these numbers when we first saw them, and apparently we weren't alone; as James Hohmann wrote in Politico, nobody who is paying close attention to this race actually believes that Beauprez has a 10-point lead.
The Quinnipiac poll results were questionable from the jump because the results are such an extreme outlier compared to all of the other publicly-available polling in this race…including those from yet another new poll. According to Project New America, a progressive research organization with a long history of polling in Colorado, their data shows Hickenlooper with a 7-point lead over Beauprez:
– John HIckenlooper leads by seven points in Colorado (51% to 44%). The gap in strong support is similar (+7), with 49% firmly in the Governor’s camp and 42% solidly behind Beauprez.
– Importantly, in the Governor’s race, while Hickenlooper holds a slight edge among self-identified independents (47 percent for Hickenlooper to 43 percent for Beauprez), Beauprez suffers from double-digit defections among self-identified Republicans (14 for Hickenlooper to 86 percent for Beauprez). Hickenlooper has far fewer defections among self-identified Democrats (he leads among them 91 to 5 percent).
– Notably, among the 94 percent of voters who can identify John Hickenlooper, positive impressions of him remain slightly higher than negative impressions with 44 percent expressing warm, favorable feelings and 39 percent expressing cool, unfavorable feelings. In contrast, among the 79 percent of voters who can identify Bob Beauprez today negative impressions outweigh positive ones by 4-points, with 34 percent expressing cool, negative feelings and 30 percent expressing warm, positive feelings.
You can debate whether you believe the Quinnipiac poll is more accurate than the Project New America poll, but the latter is much more comparable to last week's SurveyUSA/Denver Post poll on the Governor's race.
If this entire story seems somewhat familiar — it should. It was at about this same point in the 2006 Governor's race that Steve Paulson of the Associated Press inexplicably reported that the race between Beauprez and Democrat Bill Ritter was essentially a toss-up. That story was particularly absurd, given that every other known poll had Ritter with a better than double-digit lead over Beauprez (Ritter would win that race by a 17-point margin).
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Colorado will pick Hick — again.
Colorado will reject BothWays — again.
The rest is pretty much just noise.
GOTV, Dems!
I'm guessing Skippy and Zippy have done their Dumphuckistan mathimatikal ekuashon and conclude this means Hick is still down three after factoring in the +10 BWB wave.
Please stop. You aren't helping. I normally vote Republican for "SANE" candidates! You are making us just look like we are playing checkers while they are playing chess.
Please please please stop!
Moderate Angry Trucker
Beauprez and Gardner are toast. I guarantee you, the right wingers won't mention these polls at all.
The PNA poll is bogus. I promise you that more Republicans will vote than Democrats in Colorado this year. Their sample is unjustifiable.
There will be a higher turnout this year because of mail in voting and that favors the democrats. 😉 Both ways Bob becomes a two time loser. Count on it.
Oh noes! Mail in ballots! The nerve of those people to just mark them and drop them in the mail. How can Republicans disenfranchise them is they don't have to stand in hours long lines? Damn those liberals for encouraging more people to exercise their Constitutional right to participate in our democracy. That really fucks up your model for Republican success (only a few radical white guys getting to vote) doesn't it Moldy?
Litle modster, you promised us Romney in a landslide. You promised us Gessler, for God' sake. Pardon us if we don't shake in our boots over your promises. Maybe you should revise them to opinions.
Who responds to these polls? My phone landline rings, on average, once a day, from someone either taking a poll or seeking my vote. I do not answer if the caller id identifies them, and when I do answer, I decline to take the poll. It is not that I am against them, it is just that if I answered them, I would be taking inordinate amounts of time. I do not think that I am unique. I do not think my attitude is partisan; democrats and republicans are probably equally uncooperative. So, who is answering these polls? In what way are they representative or unrepresentative of the population? I am sure this is something that the pollsters are aware of and try to deal with. But the very existence of so many polls seems to be making the results unreliable.
I looooove trolling pollers. I jump at the chance to tell them what they largely don't want to hear. You don't call my neighborhood looking for a Democrat. Relaxing and I can't still do paperwork while I say, no, never, not gonna work for the Repub, no matter what.
I'll bet these are land-line polls and by now everyone, including the pollsters, know they skew older and more conservative. I still have my landline because there are people we hear from only occasionally who have that number, Also, we have elderly parents who can gab for hours and chew up cell minutes..On the other hand, a lot of people won't answer a call from an unfamiliar (especially toll) call on a cell. I wonder how pollsters correct for that phenomenon?
Same here. I never pick up cell or landline unless I recognize the number.
I made an exception last night because the ID came up "Opinion Poll" and I was in a fiesty mood 🙂