Whit Ayres, April 21

Whit Ayres’ comments in The Washington Post on the challenges Donald J. Trump would face in a general election:

“One thing you learn very quickly in political consulting is the fruitlessness of trying to get a candidate to change who he or she fundamentally is at their core,” said Republican strategist Whit Ayres, who did polling for Rubio’s presidential campaign before he dropped out of the race. “So is the snide, insulting, misogynistic guy we’ve seen really who Donald Trump is? Or is it the disciplined, respectful, unifying Trump we saw for seven minutes after the New York primary?

“None of us can give ourselves a personality transplant,” Ayres added.

To read the full article, please click here.

Slider: aDano

Jon McHenry, February 3

Jon McHenry’s comments in the Washington Times regarding President Obama’s plans to increase the use of executive orders:

“I think what it does is fire up Republicans to turn out to make sure they put in a Senate majority that can stop Obama,” said Republican pollster Jon McHenry, vice president of North Star Opinion Research in Alexandria, Va. “You’re going to see Republicans all up in arms that Obama’s going against the Constitution and trying to be a king and a dictator. It helps ramp up Republican turnout that was already probably going to be pretty good.”

To read the full article, please click here.

Resurgent Republic 2012 Post Election Survey

Our post-election survey for Resurgent Republic, conducted November 6-8, shows that the 2012 election marks the year when the inexorable march of demographic change caught up with the Republican Party. While multiple factors led to President Obama’s reelection, none was as important as rapidly increasing demographic change in the American electorate.

For the full analysis, including links to the toplines and presentation, please click here.

Twitter Political Index

North Star Opinion Research is pleased to join with Twitter, the Mellman Group, and Topsy in announcing the Twitter Political Index, or “Twindex.” Using Twitter’s “firehose” of data, Topsy has constructed an algorithm that places mentions of Mitt Romney and Barack Obama into context with the total conversation on Twitter. The Twindex is similar to a percentile score: a score of 39 for one of the candidates would mean that mentions for the candidate on that day were more positive than 39 percent of all tweets that day; a score of 60 would mean the candidate’s mentions were more positive than 60 percent of all tweets that day.

It is important to note that the Twindex isn’t a poll. Twitter’s blog puts it this way:

Just as new technologies like radar and satellite joined the thermometer and barometer to give forecasters a more complete picture of the weather, so too can the Index join traditional methods like surveys and focus groups to tell a fuller story of political forecasts. It lends new insight into the feelings of the electorate, but is not intended to replace traditional polling — rather, it reinforces it.

Two good media summaries of the Twindex can be found on National Journal and Huffington Post.

Understanding the Gender Gap

Note: This post is also available on the Resurgent Republic website.

The discussion of the “War on Women” between the Democratic and Republican camps in the last few months focuses in large part on perceptions of a gender gap for Republicans. Recent elections have traditionally shown a gender gap on both sides of the aisle, with Republicans performing better among men and Democrats earning more support among women. The natural question in light of this spring’s discussion is whether the gender gap is worse for Republicans now or reflective of well-known challenges evidenced in recent years.

The gender gap was seen in 2008, with John McCain competitive among men (trailing Barack Obama 48-49 percent in exit poll results) but not competitive among women (trailing 43-56 percent). But that gender gap masks the effect of race. McCain won among both white men (57-41 percent) and white women (53-46 percent).

That surface gender gap remains in polling data now. For example, in Resurgent Republic’s May 2012 survey, men nominally favor Republicans on the congressional generic ballot 44-43 percent, while women prefer the generic Democrat by a 47-36 percent margin. By race, white men prefer a Republican by a 52-33 percent margin and white women prefer a Republican by a 44-39 percent margin, black men prefer a Democrat by an 85-9 percent margin and black women prefer a Democrat by an 85-3 percent margin; and Hispanic men prefer a Democrat by a 62-29 percent margin and Hispanic women prefer a Democrat by a 61-22 percent margin. So a gender gap is still seen among whites, but with support among both white men and white women.

There is a gender gap in views of President Obama as well, with men viewing him unfavorably (45 percent favorable-50 percent unfavorable) and women viewing him favorably (55-42 percent). White men and white women both give the President negative ratings, with white men giving the President a 36-59 percent favorable-unfavorable rating compared to a 47-49 percent rating among white women.

Looking at Resurgent Republic’s November 2011 survey indicates that any change since November is minor, with a slight improvement for congressional Democrats among white women (but not at the expense of congressional Republicans). Republicans still hold an advantage among Independent white women, although the margin has tightened somewhat from +13 in November (37-24 percent) to +5 today (35-30 percent).

The small gender gap among whites for congressional candidates disappears for several issues tested in the May 2012 survey. For example, men prefer a conservative view of fairness focused on eliminating crony capitalism and everyone paying their share over a liberal view focused on the rich paying their fair share by a 60-35 percent margin and women prefer a conservative view by a 59-34 percent margin.

Women agree with men on the statement that the way to reduce the deficit is to restrain government spending and reform our tax code to promote more growth, rather than that we must have more revenue if we are ever going to close the deficit and make the wealthy pay their fair share (51-41 percent among women and 54-39 percent among men). But women split on increasing capital gains taxes, with 45 percent agreeing that it makes no sense to raise capital gains taxes since it will reduce revenue for the government and 44 percent agreeing that we should raise taxes on capital gains for the wealthy, regardless of whether or not it will increase revenue for the government, because we need to ensure fairness. Men agree with the conservative view by a 49-42 percent margin.

Perhaps because President Obama is specifically named, there is a gender gap seen on energy as well, albeit one that shrinks when considering race. Women overall agree that President Obama’s energy policies have been good for the country by a 48-43 percent margin, while men agree that President Obama’s energy policies have been bad for the country by a 55-39 percent margin. White women agree that President Obama’s energy policies have been bad for the country by a 49-42 percent margin (53-39 among Independent white women, 12-78 among black women, and 41-53 among Hispanic women), while white men agree by a 62 to 33 percent margin (26-69 among black men and 38-53 among Hispanic men). Ultimately, the failed policies of any administration are laid at the president’s feet, but conservatives would do well to keep the focus on the policy as much as possible.

To the extent that the gender gap exists today, the left has done a better job pointing to conservatives’ “War on Women” as the cause. However, the timeline suggests that the gender gap today is relatively consistent with the political landscape from November of last year. That being said, Republicans should continue to closely measure any additional movement among Independent white women.

March 2012 Survey for YG Policy Center

Our March survey for the YG Policy Center, conducted with 1,000 registered voters nationally, focused on attitudes regarding the 2010 health care reform law.

The results show that, nearly two years after its passage, voters remain opposed to the health care reform law, are skeptical of its effects, and think President Obama’s claims about the law before its passage are not true.

Our presentation of the results can be seen here. An analysis memo written for the YG Network is available here, and the full results are available here.

Whit Ayres, February 14/Solyndra

Whit Ayres’ comments on the GOP message regarding Solyndra in the Associated Press:

“All of the sudden the companies that end up getting the grants are those who happen to be well politically connected,” said Whit Ayres, a Republican pollster, explaining the GOP’s Solyndra message.

For the full article, please click here.

The Context of the Health Care Debate in 2012

Jon McHenry discusses the context of the health care debate in the 2012 elections.

Whit Ayres, January 24

Whit Ayres’ comments on the political environment in the Cleveland Plain Dealer:

Romney has “had a bad couple of weeks,” said GOP pollster Whit Ayers. “But what we know about independents is that they move around even more quickly than Republicans these days. And just because independents move one way after a bad couple of weeks tells you nothing about where they will end up.”

Click here for the full text.