August 31, 2012 11:14 PM UTC

GOP Convention Fail: No Poll Bump for Romney

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• by: Mark Mehringer

( – promoted by Colorado Pols)

I have been warning my polling clients for the last couple months to expect the usual bump in poll numbers for Republicans during the GOP convention.  But here is the funny thing, according to Gallup’s daily tracking poll  (the gold standard in polling), Romney has not seen any convention bump – or any sort of boost in support from naming Ryan as his running mate.  Nothing – not even one percentage point.

To be fair, Gallup reports a 7-day rolling tracking poll for President, so through Thursday night, only 3 of the 7 nights in the poll reflect the GOP convention.  But you should see at least some change.

In fact, Obama has actually risen 2 points since Romney chose Ryan for his running mate.  And that is in a poll with a 2 point margin of error.

So what does this mean for the election just over two months away?  Romney has now been defined and the polls should remain relatively stable until the debates, and possibly through November 6.

At the end of the Republican primary fight, Romney was largely an unknown to many Democrats and most independents.  The hundreds of millions of dollars of ad spending over the summer has introduced Romney to those voters.  I consider this to be largely a success of the Obama campaign.  Voters are split on their view of Romney.  He has been unsuccessful in defining himself as a new, inspirational leader to bring us out of tough times.

In many ways, this appears to be a similar race as we saw in 2004, with the partisan roles flipped.  Back in 2004, President Bush was up for reelection with fairly weak approval and economic numbers.  Obama’s ratings today are pretty similar.  

Back in 2004, a rich white guy (John Kerry) from Massachusetts won the opposition party’s nomination.  He picked another white guy as his running mate.  Pretty much exactly the same thing here.  

And in 2004, it was a close race to the end, just as it is here.  But at no point did Kerry (and do I think Romney) will surge ahead.

In the Post-9/11 world, Americans are fairly risk averse.  In 2004, they did not want to risk another 9/11.  In 2012, they don’t want to risk another 2008 style economic collapse.  

The GOP convention gave Romney the opportunity to portray himself more like Bill Clinton did in 1992 – as someone with a new approach to help us overcome a tepid recovery.  Romney passed on that opportunity, and instead took the less risky approach of attacking the status quo but offering nothing new to replace it.  And as a result, his standing in the polls is the same as it was at the beginning of the month – barely behind.