Archive for the ‘Polling’ Category

It’s pretty clear that Keith Ellison knows a thing or two about being slippery. With a week left before Election Day, Keith Ellison is still attempting to slip away from Karen Monahan’s accusations.

It’s fun reading that “Keith Ellison stood in front of reporters this week desperate to redefine the attorney general’s race as his poll numbers slide. The Democratic congressman’s campaign has been overshadowed for the two months since his ex-girlfriend accused him of physical and emotional abuse.” As the candidate with near universal name recognition, he’s fighting a difficult problem:

Ellison has denied the allegations, but the damage was done. Once leading Republican opponent Doug Wardlow in polls, Ellison trails by 7 percentage points in the most recent Minneapolis Star Tribune/MPR News survey. Still, Ellison has hope: the same poll shows 16 percent of voters say they’re not sure who they’ll choose. So there he was Thursday in the basement conference room at the state Capitol, imploring voters to examine Wardlow’s record instead of his own troubles.

Ellison doesn’t have much hope. Most undecideds break away from well-known candidates. If they know who you are but are still undecided, that isn’t a vote of confidence. That’s a sign that voters aren’t satisfied with their options.

Here’s mathematical proof that Ellison is in trouble. Let’s suppose that 1,000 likely voters were polled. If Ellison is getting 36% of the vote, then convinced 2/3rds of undecideds to vote him, which is highly unlikely, Ellison would finish with 467 votes. Wardlow is getting 43% of the vote. If he convinced 33% of the undecideds to vote for him, he’d finish with 483 votes.

The reality is that Ellison isn’t likely to win 67% of undecideds. He’ll be lucky to convince 50% of undecideds to vote for him. If Ellison and Wardlow each won half of the undecideds, Wardlow would finish with 51% of the final vote. Frankly, Ellison’s support of Assata Shakur should disqualify him from being Minnesota’s Attorney General:

Then, too, so should Ellison’s statement that he wouldn’t uphold Minnesota laws he doesn’t like. It’s time to end Keith Ellison’s political career.

John Sununu Sr.’s perspective definitely doesn’t match with the MSM’s. Just watch this interview with Bill O’Reilly and you’ll know what I mean:

I was particularly fascinated when they got to the subjects of Kavanaugh and the “migrant march.” Check out Sununu’s perspective. He said that Kavanaugh will affect the hard-cord Republican voter who was going to vote Republican. Then Sununu said that the migrant march “is going to affect the marginal Republican and the independents. Those are the ones that the surprise data has a majority talking about how they want this march stopped. So those 2 things affect the Republican vote but with 2 different groups of voters.”

I think that’s exactly right. That’s why I think the polling is missing what’s happening. It’s my theory that pollsters have misinterpreted suburban white women in a significant way. Every night, I hear how Democrats are leading with women, which I don’t doubt. That being said, I’m highly skeptical of the theory that suburban white women don’t worry about immigration.

They’re smart enough to know that those illegal immigrants pile tons of extra costs on them by piling tons of additional expenses on school districts and safety net programs.

The other thing that Gov. Sununu said that makes sense is that he disputes the notion that the union worker who’s voted Democrat “all his life except in 2016” will vote Democrat in 2018. Gov. Sununu thinks that Trump’s economy has earned him tons of good will with union workers. I wholeheartedly agree. Here in Minnesota, the DFL doesn’t have much of a chance of winning back the private sector unions anytime soon. That’s why Pete Stauber will handily win in the Eighth District.

This NYTimes article highlights in detail the difficulty Keith Ellison finds himself in.

It states “But in recent weeks, Mr. Wardlow has received one of the biggest political gifts of the midterm election cycle, in large part because of his opponent’s fall from grace, after Mr. Ellison’s former girlfriend said that he mistreated her. The charges, which Mr. Ellison denies, have snapped voters to attention across the state. The race has shifted dramatically in Mr. Wardlow’s favor. Last month, Mr. Ellison had a five-point lead among likely voters, according to a Star Tribune/Minnesota Public Radio News poll. But the numbers have more than flipped: Mr. Wardlow has taken a seven-point lead, according to the group’s new poll taken last week.”

Clearly, Ellison’s trend-line is working against him. That’s the least bad news for Ellison. When I wrote this post, I noted this:

Voters in Hennepin and Ramsey counties preferred Ellison in the new poll, but Wardlow was ahead in every other part of the state. Wardlow’s support also grew among voters aged 18 to 34. That age group went for Ellison by a wide margin in the September poll, and while he still leads among such voters, the percentage that backed Wardlow more than doubled.

That isn’t the worst of it. Ellison has virtually 100% name recognition. There’s still lots of potential voters who are undecided. If Ellison hasn’t closed the deal with them, he isn’t likely to.

Here’s the big picture view of the race according to the Strib-MPR Poll:

When I looked at the biggest problem facing Keith Ellison according to the KSTP/SurveyUSA poll, it was easy getting caught up with the 41%-41% ‘horserace’ figure. That a candidate with virtually no name recognition is tied with a candidate with virtually universal name recognition isn’t exactly commonplace.

That isn’t what caught my attention most, though. Q4 of the KSTP/SurveyUSA poll asks “Minnesota will also elect an Attorney General. If the election for Attorney General were today, and you were filling out your ballot right now, who would you vote for? (candidate names rotated) “, the poll found that 43% of independents said that they’d vote for Wardlow but just 27% said that they’d vote for Ellison. What’s even more striking is the fact that Ellison finished third, behind Wardlow 43% and Undecided at 27%.

Here’s the horse race graph of the race:

It’s also worth noting that 14% of all voters are undecideds. It isn’t a stretch to think that those voters won’t break for Ellison considering the fact that he’s such a known commodity.

The first time I read the headline to this article, I had to do a doubletake. The headline said “KSTP/SurveyUSA Poll: Ellison, Wardlow in Dead Heat in Attorney General Race.” I could picture it being close but tied? That was further than my imagination could stretch. Then I watched this video:

Democrats have had a vice grip on the office of Minnesota attorney general for 47 years, but the 2018 race for that job is shaping up as the closest in decades. A KSTP/SurveyUSA poll shows Democrat Keith Ellison and Republican Doug Wardlow deadlocked at 41 percent each. “This is anybody’s race,” said political scientist Steven Schier. “Ellison is vulnerable in a way other Democrats are not.”

When he jumped into the AG’s race, most Minnesota pundits thought it was Ellison’s to lose. If he loses, it’ll be the end of Ellison’s political career. How do you overcome a setback like that? It’s one thing to win over former Republicans. IT’s quite another to win back #MeToo Democrats.

The only thing missing from the headline is the theme song from the Twilight Zone.

I’m semi-stunned with the first polling for the DFL primary in Minnesota’s Eighth District. First, the polling company was “conducted by Victoria Research and Consulting for the Radinovich campaign. The firm, based in Maryland, has worked in Minnesota’s Eighth District since first hired by the late Jim Oberstar in 1992.” Next, “the company interviewed 400 likely DFL primary voters in the Eighth District from May 12-17. Of the five DFLers in the race, Lee had the highest name recognition at 39 percent, while Radinovich was second at 30 percent. Fewer than one-in-four likely primary voters had heard of state Rep. Jason Metsa or North Branch Mayor Kristen Hagen Kennedy.”

That few people had heard of Kristen Hagen-Kennedy isn’t surprising. That few people have heard of Jason Metsa is stunning. He’s a state legislator. He’s been re-elected, too. That isn’t the only bad news for Metsa, though. Here’s more:

The survey considered the candidates support within the district’s two major media markets, Duluth and the Twin Cities. Lee had a clear lead in the Duluth market, with 24 percent support, while Radinovich was second at 18 percent. Metsa finished third with 15 percent support while Kennedy had the backing of just four percent of those polled.

Radinovich holds a clear lead, however, in the southern part of the district, with 17 percent support. Kennedy was in second place at nine percent, while Lee finished third at seven percent. Metsa came in at just two percent support.

In other words, Metsa is tanking outside of his back yard.

Lee represents an interesting dilemma for the DFL. She’s well-known, popular and she opposes copper-nickel mining:

The last thing the DFL needs is for there to be a tough fight between the pro-mining people and the anti-mining activists as their 2 finalists duke it out. That’s what this is shaping up to be at this point. It’s impossible to forget, too, that Leah Phifer won all 10 of the ballots at the DFL CD-8 Convention, though she didn’t win the endorsement. Let’s remember, too, that Rebecca Otto’s only win in the Precinct Caucus straw poll was in CD-8. They might’ve gotten rid of Phifer but they haven’t gotten rid of the environmental activists.

I expect Radinovich to win the primary because there will a significant turnout for the pro-mining Swanson-Nolan gubernatorial ticket in the primary in the Eighth. That shouldn’t be underestimated. However, it wouldn’t be wise to predict a Radinovich victory in November if the Erin-Squared ticket wins the gubernatorial primary. An Erin-Squared victory will likely have a negative effect on turnout in the Eighth District.

Julie Kelly’s article for the Federalist demolishes the Democrats’ chanting point that it’s a matter of when, not if, Democrats retake the US House of Representatives.

Digging into recent polling reveals some glaring weaknesses for Democrats. These aren’t insignificant weaknesses. They’re game-changing weaknesses. For instance, Kelly reports that “there is no ‘enthusiasm gap’ for Democrats. In fact, Republicans now seem more motivated to vote in November: 86 percent of Republicans say they are absolutely or certain to vote this fall, compared to 81 percent of Democrats.”

That’s the first time I’ve read that this cycle. If that holds, Democrats won’t retake the House. On the Senate side, that might indicate a red wave of historic proportions. Prior to this, I’ve been predicting Republicans gaining 4-5 seats net in the Senate. If the enthusiasm gap disappears, Republicans might have a big red wave staring at them. Instead of just flipping seats in West Virginia, Missouri, North Dakota, Indiana and Montana, the GOP might flip Florida, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, too.

The bad news for Democrats continues:

While white college graduates favor Democrats by nine points, non-college whites prefer a Republican congressional candidate by nearly 30 points, devastating news about a core constituency of the Democratic Party going forward.

This sums my thoughts up precisely:

A slim majority also said gun violence has no effect on whether they will vote Republican or Democrat. So it looks like the nonstop media exploitation of the Parkland school shooting did not work for the Left.

I don’t see a wave, be it blue or red. There just isn’t an appetite for a major change. The economy is getting stronger, which usually leads to not rocking the boat at the voting booth.

The political tide is turning. It’s unmistakable. It isn’t that Democrats can’t get their message out, which is their cop-out explanation for why they fell short of their goals. It’s that they’ve become the lecturing party or the ideological party rather than being the listening party or the solutions party.

Tammy Bruce’s op-ed highlights the Democrats’ tactics. In her op-ed, Ms. Bruce said “For a long time, the Democrats have been successful by scaring people into voting for them. It’s a tactic used when you can’t persuade people on policy. Americans were recently reminded of the Democrats’ usual refrain when House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi declared President Trump’s tax cuts as ‘Armageddon.’ Mrs. Pelosi went there, relying on contrived drama, comparing a tax cut to a fight between biblical armies during the end times. When the Senate GOP was discussing Mr. Trump’s health care bill, the Democrats’ response? ‘Hundreds of thousands of people will die,’ delivered again by Nancy ‘We’re all gonna die’ Pelosi.”

In late October, 2017, Democrats thought that they were looking at a blue wave. That’s before Republicans passed the Trump/GOP tax cuts and President Trump signed them into law right before Christmas. Since then, the trend has been unmistakable. While there’ve been a few bumps in the road for Republicans, the RCP average of polling of the generic ballot question has headed in the Republicans’ favor:

Speaking of messaging, the Republicans’ message has consisted of telling people about the strengthening economy, fatter paychecks and greater financial security. The Democrats’ message, compliments of Ms. Pelosi, has sounded like fingernails across a chalkboard.

The Democrats aren’t ready for primetime. They’ve pandered to Moms Demand Action rather than putting forward plans to make schools safer. They’ve pandered to La Raza rather than getting criminal illegal aliens off the street. Meanwhile, Nancy Pelosi has talked in apocalyptic terms to frighten people to vote for Democrats:

Keith Ellison, the deputy chairman of the Democratic National Committee, was handed the Grim Reaper baton when he said this to the Progressive National Candidate Training gathering last week: “Women are dying because we are losing elections,” Mr. Ellison said, Fox News Insider reported. “We don’t have the right to lose a damn election. We have to win.” Mr. Ellison was referring to a reported rise in maternal mortality rates in Missouri and Texas. The good news is, for Texas, that report has already been disproven, and explained by a computer reporting error.

And what is their argument really based on? The infantilizing of women. Underscoring Mr. Ellison’s remarks is an argument that women are so fragile, so vulnerable, that if Democrats don’t win and government doesn’t control more of your life, you’ll die. That is an inherently sexist argument, promoting the fraud that women can’t control their own lives and need a Big Brother to help them along.

Back in January, I wrote this post, which I titled “2018: No wave, barely a ripple?” At the time, I wasn’t sure if the trend towards Republicans would continue. If I wrote that article today, I’d omit the question mark from the title. The blue wave propaganda is coming from people like Chris Cillizza and other mindless lefties. The polling is clear. Nobody thinks that the improving economy and fat bonuses isn’t changing the mindset of the American people.

The DC/NY worrywarts should take a valium. The Trump/GOP tax cuts virtually sell themselves. Republicans still have to get out the vote but the policy sells itself. There’s a lesson I learned from a small business near my house. It’s legendary, actually. It’s called Val’s Rapidserv. They’ve been in business for 50+ years. I might be wrong on this but I don’t remember ever hearing a radio ad for them, most likely because their word-of-mouth advertising is exceptional.

This morning, I spoke with a person who owned a business right by Val’s. This entrepreneur told me that they “piggyback off of Val’s”, telling callers that they’re right next to Val’s.

The point is this: Val’s has 100% name recognition and the best fries in Minnesota. This translates to politics. If you’ve got a great reputation and a fantastic product to sell, you’ll win if you work hard. That’s where Republicans are at right now.

This month’s Fox News poll shows a tightening of the generic ballot question. In this latest poll, Republicans trail Democrats 46%-41%. That’s down from October, 2017, when Democrats led the generic ballot question 50%-35%.

Another poll question that should work in the Republicans’ favor asks “Compared to this time last year, do you feel more optimistic or less optimistic for the coming year about each of the following?” On their personal happiness, 60% were more optimistic with only 22% saying less optimistic. On “Your family’s financial situation”, 51% said that they’re more optimistic while 32% were less optimistic.

Republican pollster Daron Shaw, who conducts the poll with Democrat Chris Anderson, said “Just winning the popular national vote is not enough to flip the House. Given the GOP’s districting advantages, data from 2012 and 2014 show the Democrats need an edge of at least five points to bring the majority into play.”

Another thing working in Republicans’ favor is President Trump’s approval rating, which sits at 45%. By comparison, President Trump’s approval rating in October was 38%. At that point, Republicans trailed in the generic ballot question by 15 points, 50%-35%.

One thing that will hurt Republicans a bit is their voting for the latest budget deal. The grass roots aren’t happy with that. That being said, something is working in their favor, which is the quality of the parties’ closing arguments. Republicans should highlight morning, noon and night the fact that every Democrat in the House and every Democrat in the Senate voted against the Trump/GOP tax cuts that got the economy soaring and that provided pay raises and bonuses. Reinforce the fact that people’s paychecks are fatter, too. Reinforce the fact that families won’t get penalized for not buying health insurance they couldn’t afford because Republicans eliminated the Obamacare individual mandate, too.

This is positive news for Republicans. There’s still many months to go but things are improving.

President Trump hasn’t been bashful in calling Nancy Pelosi the “Republicans’ secret weapon” in the 2018 election. Perhaps the President needs to rethink that opinion. It isn’t that Pelosi has quickly gotten popular. She’s still as unpopular as ants at a picnic. It’s that Chuck Schumer’s popularity has taken a significant dip recently.

The latest Quinnipiac University Poll “found that 53 percent of voters approve of the job the minority leader is doing in the Senate, while 35 percent do not approve. That is the lowest approval rating Schumer has received since 1999, just months after he was first elected to the U.S. Senate.”

Sen. Schumer is a major drag on battleground state Democrats. How many Democrat senators he’ll hurt remains to be seen but his decisions have already contributed to the Democrats’ vulnerable situation going into 2018. The #SchumerShutdown hurt immensely. The only thing that’s hurt Democrats more was unanimously rejecting the Trump/GOP tax cuts. As a result, Democrats should consider a net loss of less than 5 seats in the Senate a moral victory.

The latest Democrat mistake is rejecting President Trump’s immigration plan. The Common Sense Coalition’s plan isn’t serious about border security, which I explained in this post:

On Pg. 51 of the amendment, we learn that $1,571,000,000,000 is appropriated to build President Trump’s wall in 2018. Further, $2,500,000,000,000 is available to be appropriated in each year starting in 2019 and going through 2027. Further, the legislative language states that “the amount specified in subsection (d) for each of fiscal years 2019-2027 shall not be available for such fiscal year unless (A) the Secretary submits to Congress, not later than 60 days before the start of such fiscal year a report setting forth a description of every planned expenditure…, (B) a description of the total number of miles of security fencing… etc.

The money isn’t appropriated all at once, meaning that future congresses can stop the building of the wall. Don’t think President Trump won’t campaign against red state Democrats on that issue this fall. I’d bet the proverbial ranch that will be a major thorn in the Democrats’ sides.

Democrats shouldn’t think that they have political cover on this, either. Just because Jeff Flake, Lindsey Graham and Bob Corker signed onto the bill doesn’t provide cover. It simply means the American people reject them, saying a pox on all their houses. The American people want real border security. They aren’t interested in political gamesmanship, which is what the Collins-Durbin-Graham bill was. This video is misleading:

Just $1,571,000,000 is appropriated to build the wall. The rest of the money is promised but not appropriated. Sound familiar?

Democrats are playing a risky game. Don’t bet on it turning out well for them this fall.

UPDATE: This video exposes Democrats: