Earlier today I came across a press release by long shot Congressional candidate R.J. Harris. Harris is challenging Congressman Tom Cole, who represents Oklahoma’s Fourth Congressional District, in next year’s Republican primary.
The press release said:
September 10, 2009 – Internal polling from the RJ Harris 2010 campaign shows Rep. Tom Cole, the incumbent since 2003 at 54%, RJ Harris at 31%, and 15% undecided. The number of undecided-votes clearly shows Harris within striking distance of an incumbent that should have had all undecided-votes nailed down years ago. This poll was conducted by Persistence Consulting LLC and included likely Republican primary voters from the 4th district.
I was instantly skeptical of this poll. To measure its validity, I decided to take a look at each candidate, and learn more about a polling firm I had never heard of.
Congressman Cole hasn’t had a competitive race or strong opponent since 2002, when he defeated Democrat Darryl Roberts in an expensive, hard-fought contest for the open seat.
In 2004, Cole won his first re-election with 78% of the vote, easily defeating an independent and outpolling President Bush. In 2006, while Governor Henry coasted to re-election and Democrats won all but one statewide office, Congressman Cole won 65% of voters. And in 2008, he carried the district with 66% of the vote, the same as John McCain.
Are we really to believe that a candidate winning general elections by these margins is only able to garner the support of 54% of likely Republican primary voters?
Harris will no doubt point to Cole’s vote for the Troubled Asset Relief Program, but that occurred before the last election and his performance was nearly identical to 2006. Since last fall, Cole has voted against the stimulus package and cap-and-trade, and been an outspoken opponent of the unpopular health care proposals advanced by the Democratic Congress.
It is difficult to precisely measure Cole’s popularity among the Republican primary electorate because we only have one example: the original six-way primary in 2002, which Cole won with 60% of the vote. Maybe the absence of any challengers indicates how he is viewed by Republicans in the Fourth District.
Perhaps the most surprising part of the poll is that R.J. Harris received the support of 31% of voters. Harris just began campaigning recently and he has struggled to raise funds in the district. Of the 7 donors identified in his latest FEC filing, only 2 are from Oklahoma. His only traditional advertising has been $350 in radio ads; the remainder has been spent on Facebook. It is questionable whether Harris can even be identified by 31% of Republican primary voters, much less have earned their support.
These issues could possibly be resolved by examining the methodology, sample size, timeframe, and margin of error of the poll. Unfortunately, this information was not provided in the press release.
In an effort to find out more, I searched online for Persistence Consulting, and this is where things became interesting. A significant portion of the results were directly related to the R.J. Harris press release.
There was a poorly-designed home page for Persistence Consulting, with very little content. The site does list an odd mix of clients. Most appear to be long shot, political newcomer candidates, yet at the bottom was Bob McDonnell, the current frontrunner in the race for Governor of Virginia. R.J. Harris does not appear on this list.
However, what caught my attention was a reference to Persistence Consulting on a Democratic blog about Wisconsin politics. Dan Sebring is challenging incumbent Congresswoman Gwen Moore in Wisconsin’s Fourth Congressional District. Sebring is listed as a client on the Persistence Consulting website.
(Gwen Moore, by the way, has been elected to Congress three times, winning 69 to 87% of the vote over the last three election cycles. Wisconsin’s Fourth Congressional District, which is 33% African-American and 11% Hispanic, last elected a Republican in 1947.)
This June, Sebring released a poll that claimed to “show Gwen Moore with 54% of the vote, Dan Sebring with 32% of the vote, and 14% of the district as undecided. (sample size: 1,003 households, error rate +/- 2%).”
Compare those numbers with the R.J. Harris poll (Cole 54, Harris 31, undecided 15).
Does it strike you as suspicious that Persistence Consulting has had two polls in three months – their only two polls I could find any mention of online – showing safe incumbent Representatives with exactly 54% of the vote, their long shot challenger clients with 31/32%, and 14/15% undecided?
The Harris campaign and Persistence Consulting should make more information available so we can determine if this poll is in any way accurate or reliable. What is the sample size of the poll? What is the margin of error? When was it conducted? What did they mean when they said the poll “included” likely Republican primary voters? Were unlikely voters included? Or non-Republicans?
R.J. Harris was eager to share the results of this poll, plastering it across Facebook. Hopefully he is as eager to share the details and defend his credibility.
The author Michael Patlan, is a Republican who lives in the Fourth District.
