PPP/DFA Poll: Coffman 40%, Miklosi 36%

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by: Colorado Pols

UPDATE: Just to clarify, as we didn’t see this in other reporting, today’s poll of CD-6 was paid for by Democracy for America, but conducted by Public Policy Polling.

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FOX 31’s Eli Stokols:

Despite raising relatively little money, Democrat Joe Miklosi appears to be within striking distance of his well-funded GOP opponent, Congressman Mike Coffman, according to a poll from a Democratic group.

Democracy For America, a liberal political action committee based in Vermont and founded by the state’s former Gov. Howard Dean, released a poll Thursday showing Coffman ahead of Miklosi 40-36 percent…

They were also asked about GOP vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan’s proposed changes to the Medicare system; and only 16 percent of respondents said they supported “turning Medicare into a voucher program.”

Here’s Democracy for America’s poll memo.

These are obviously friendly numbers for Democratic challenger Joe Miklosi, as DFA is a supporting organization–so many observers will be inclined to pad incumbent Mike Coffman’s lead in this poll by a few points to account for “house effect.” That said, any poll showing Miklosi within striking distance of Coffman is going to be optimistically received by Democrats, and in the absence of other information, Miklosi’s campaign is sure to (and should) trumpet these results as evidence–that if Democratic wallets open up, and stay open, maybe he’s got a chance.

15 thoughts on “PPP/DFA Poll: Coffman 40%, Miklosi 36%”

caroman says:

August 16, 2012 at 10:45 pm

Per the Arapahoe County clerk’s website this morning.

Active voters:

GOP 88,083

DEM 78,472

Ouch. Dems had the lead in the ’08 campaign.

A silver lining: only 57% of voting age residents are registered to vote.

Bottom line — We need to redouble our voter registration efforts in Arapahoe County (and, maybe the entire state).

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1. ArapaGOP says:
  
  August 17, 2012 at 1:02 am
  
  🙂
  
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2. RedGreen says:
  
  August 17, 2012 at 1:11 am
  
  Did Dems have the lead at the end of July in 2008? Lets compare apples with apples.
  
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  1. caroman says:
    
    August 17, 2012 at 1:29 am
    
    1) It is now the middle of August, and I think they update their numbers regularly.
    
    2) I remember telling reporters at the DNC that I ran into, like Chuck Todd and Wolf Blitzer, that we had the lead at that time.
    
    3) 9,600 is a lot to be behind.
    
    4) See ArapaGOoP’s comment above.
    
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Gadfly says:

August 16, 2012 at 10:52 pm

Are there any numbers for CD 3?

Is the DCCC planning to go on the air anytime soon?

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ArapaGOP says:

August 16, 2012 at 11:00 pm

I’ll take these numbers, especially adding 5 for house effect (good suggestion Pols). Welcome back Rep. Coffman.

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1. Gadfly says:
  
  August 16, 2012 at 11:04 pm
  
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2. ArapaGOP says:
  
  August 17, 2012 at 12:34 am
  
  It’s a PPP poll? Make that a 10 point house effect. Thanks, Pols!
  
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  1. ParkHill says:
    
    August 17, 2012 at 2:09 am
    
    You have to look at how one pollster does against the average of all pollsters over time.
    
    Rasmussen is consistently more Republican than the average of all the other polls. Apparently this comes from using a likely voter screen that results in a Republican bias.
    
    PPP is in the middle of the average of all the polls, so it doesn’t have a house effect.
    
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    1. Ed Rollins says:
      
      August 17, 2012 at 2:24 am
      
      The New York Times’s polling expert Nate Silver found that Rasmussen has a +1.3 GOP “house effect” lean, whereas PPP has a +3.2 DEM lean this election.
      
      http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.n…
      
      But nice try pulling facts out of your ass…
      
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      1. Aristotle says:
        
        August 17, 2012 at 6:52 am
        
        And it’s based on modelling. Sort of like the climate change you won’t accept. But I guess modelling works if it tells you what you want to hear, though.
        
        Try reading what the post actually says, okay?
        
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        RegisteredRepublican says:
        
        August 18, 2012 at 9:25 am
        
        PPP/DFA used in their polling. At least, Rasmussen Reports allows you to read about their methodology and see the survey question wording for each of their polls. I didn’t see that option for either PPP or DFA. By the way, Pulse Opinion Research, actually does the polling for Rasmussen.
        
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        Phoenix Rising says:
        
        August 21, 2012 at 4:01 am
        
        Generally when PPP polls, all of that is available. Given that DFA is the client, though, they might not have released it this time. Daily Kos uses PPP for most of their polling, and their polls offer full crosstabs – much more detailed than Rasmussen’s polls.
        
        Also, POR is a subsidiary of Rasmussen, not the other way around. POR was created it seems to provide FOX News surveys without directly tying in to the Rasmussen name.
        
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ohwilleke says:

August 17, 2012 at 3:52 am

Read charitably, no one is paying attention, which means Miklosi with less name recognition has more room to growth than incumbent Coffman. It would be interesting to see how the raw two man race numbers line up with favorable, unfavorable, no opinion numbers on each man. If Coffman has a major favorability problem, I’m inclined to give the top line numbers more credit and see it as generalized backlash against an unpopular Congress from moderates. But, if Coffman has high “no opinion” numbers in his column, I’m pretty skeptical, because he is very much a known quantity in Colorado politics.

Read less charitably, PPP has deliberately chosen to not push for a “leaning” opinions very hard out of fear that the 6th CD, even as redistricted may have more people who are likely voters who lean GOP than lean Dem, and therefore would rather have no opinion than a bad one. Given the voter registration balance, this is a real possibility for something that influenced the survey design. A close number attracts more donations than a less close one.

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nancycronk says:

August 19, 2012 at 9:52 am

I could call four pages of names and only get a couple people at home. Seems many Coloradans have ditched their land lines for cell phones. Any guess how this will play out in this election? What does it say about the accuracy of polls? About Coffmans (faux) phone “town halls”, where his office robo-calls an announcement-type conference call?

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