A Republican pollster recently conducted a survey that found Democratic incumbent Rep. Ed Perlmutter and Ryan Frazier roughly even in their contest for Colorado’s 7th Congressional District seat.
The Magellan Strategies auto dial poll of 830 likely general election voters in the 7th CD found that Frazier was one point ahead of Perlmutter, 40 percent to 39 percent, well within the 3.4 percent margin of error.
The poll, which was politically balanced based on past election results, has been criticized for placing the election question so far into the polling sequence as it could have been biased by other questions surrounding Nancy Pelosi, Barack Obama and health care reform.
The poll asked likely voters’ opinion of Pelosi, 60 percent whom had an unfavorable opinion, directly before asking if they thought Perlmutter was doing a good job in Congress. It further asked opinions of Obama’s performance as president before asking those polled if they would vote in favor of Perlmutter or Frazier. The poll did not ask questions about other Republican lawmakers.
The poll found that in a generic contest of candidates, 45 percent would vote Republican, with 39 percent voting for the Democratic ticket. It also found that 65 percent of voters said America is on the wrong track.
While those numbers don’t sound good for Perlmutter, one stat tends to suggest that the statistics are preliminary. The poll showed that while 97 percent of respondents knew who Perlmutter was, 40 percent had never heard of Frazier.
It also showed that of those who had heard of the candidates, 39 percent had an unfavorable opinion of Perlmutter, with 37 percent favorable and 20 percent having no opinion. Likewise, Frazier had some room to grow: 22 percent had a favorable rating of the candidate, with 11 percent unfavorable and 27 percent having no opinion.
If the statistics are true, both campaigns have their work cut out for them painting a picture of who Aurora City Councilman Frazier and incumbent Congressman Perlmutter are.
