Public Policy Polling decided not to release a poll showing that Colorado State Sen. Angela Giron (D) would likely be voted out of office in Tuesday’s recall elections.
In a blogpost on the pollster’s website, PPP’s Tom Jensen said the poll, conducted last weekend, was not released because he doubted the survey’s findings.
“We did a poll last weekend in Colorado Senate District 3 and found that voters intended to recall Angela Giron by a 12 point margin, 54/42,” Jensen wrote in the post. “In a district that Barack Obama won by almost 20 points I figured there was no way that could be right and made a rare decision not to release the poll. It turns out we should have had more faith in our numbers [because] she was indeed recalled by 12 points.”
The poll, Jensen continued, also found that the gun measures that sparked the recall elections of Giron and Colorado Senate President John Morse (D), were not actually that unpopular. Morse and Giron helped narrowly pass the new gun restrictions.
“Expanded background checks for gun buyers had 68/27 support among voters in the district, reflecting the overwhelming popularity for that we’ve found across the country,” Jensen continued. “And voters were evenly divided on the law limiting high capacity ammunition magazines to 15 bullets, with 47 percent supporting and 47 percent opposing it. If voters were really making their recall votes based on those two laws, that doesn’t point to recalling Giron by a 12 point margin.”
PPP’s survey also found that voters in the lawmakers’ district had a favorable view of the the National Rifle Association, which actively supported the recall.
“We did find on the poll though that voters in the district had a favorable opinion of the NRA by a 53/33 margin,” Jensen wrote. “And I think when you see the final results what that indicates is they just did a good job of turning the election more broadly into do you support gun rights or are you opposed to them. If voters made their decision based on the actual pretty unobtrusive laws that Giron helped get passed, she likely would have survived.”
Giron and Morse were both recalled Tuesday night.
