Posted on 09/25/2002 9:53:56 AM PDT by BlackRazor
Pryor Keeps Big Lead, 'Well Positioned To Win,' Pollster Says
By David Robinson
Arkansas News Bureau
LITTLE ROCK — Mark Pryor continues to hold a double-digit lead over incumbent Tim Hutchinson in the U.S. Senate race, a second independent poll for the Arkansas News Bureau and Stephens Media Group shows.
Pryor leads Hutchinson 50 percent to 40 percent, according to Opinion Research Associates of Little Rock.
The poll of 504 people likely to vote in the Nov. 5 election was conducted from Sept. 16 through Friday and has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.5 percentage points.
"Basically we've found the same thing now twice," said pollster Ernie Oakleaf of Opinion Research, whose company first surveyed voters in August.
Using the same methods, that poll showed Pryor leading 51 percent to 41 percent.
Oakleaf did not consider the first poll's results an indicator of what would happen on Election Day.
The second poll, however, establishes a trend, he said.
"It's held for over a month even as other things were changing," Oakleaf said. "Unless something dramatic happens I think Pryor is well positioned to win. But I think it would be too early to make a firm prediction that Pryor is going to win simply because there's a lot that could happen between now and then."
He also noted that Pryor's support is right at 50 percent, and no one knows what the 10 percent of undecided voters will do.
The poll results came from interviews with 126 people in each of the state's four congressional districts.
A bad sign for Hutchinson, Oakleaf said, is that in Northwest Arkansas' 3rd Congressional District, Hutchinson got only 49 percent to Pryor's 43 percent.
Northwest Arkansas is where Republicans typically dominate. Hutchinson's hometown is Bentonville, and he served as 3rd District congressman for four years before entering the Senate in 1997.
More ominous, Oakleaf said, is that an independent poll conducted last week by Zogby International of Utica, N.Y., for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette showed Hutchinson with just 46 percent of the vote in Northwest Arkansas, and Pryor at 33 percent.
"It suggests to me that Hutchinson is not holding his base, his geographic base, as strongly as he ought to be," Oakleaf said. "The flip side of that is that Pryor continues to hold his Democratic base well."
In a written statement, Hutchinson discounted the poll's 3rd District findings.
"If anyone knows that I am strong in Northwest Arkansas, it's Mark Pryor, because he goes there every week trying to confuse people about my record and his beliefs," Hutchinson said. He said it is he, not Pryor, who represents the values of voters in the region on issues ranging from abortion to gun control.
According to the poll's other congressional district findings, Pryor leads Hutchinson:
—50 percent to 38 percent in northeastern Arkansas' 1st District.
—52 percent to 39 percent in Central Arkansas' 2nd District.
—54 percent to 33 percent in South Arkansas' 4th District.
Oakleaf, whose company built a strong record of accuracy through the 1990s by polling for television station KATV, Channel 7, in Little Rock, will conduct one additional poll for the Arkansas News Bureau before the election.
While surprised by Pryor's big margin in August, Oakleaf was much less so this week.
"I guess the reason I'm not terribly surprised is I just didn't get a sense that either one of them had gained a big advantage," he said. "I'm certainly not surprised now. Having seen these findings a month ago and seeing almost an exact replica of it this month, that's certainly not a surprise."
The only noteworthy event since the August survey, he said, was a televised debate between the two candidates.
He said, however, that he has seen few of the campaigns' numerous television advertisements.
Pryor said in a written statement that he is encouraged by the numbers but "there is still much work to do in the next six weeks."
"The numbers in this poll reflect what Arkansans have been telling me as I campaign across the state. They are tired of Tim Hutchinson's personal attacks and want a senator who focuses on real issues that matter to them," he said.
Hutchinson repeated the criticisms he had of Oakleaf's first poll, saying the method and results are flawed.
"Our most recent internal polling still has me ahead, and John Zogby — a reputable independent pollster — says the margin is razor thin, just as I have always said it would be," Hutchinson said.
The Zogby poll had Pryor leading 45.1 percent to Hutchinson's 42.6 percent.
"I remain confident in the one poll that counts on Nov. 5, when the people of Arkansas will realize how I best represent their values in Washington and re-elect me for another term as their senator," Hutchinson said.
The candidates' favorable, unfavorable ratings also remained about the same as the August poll.
In the most recent poll, 60 percent of voters said they had a favorable opinion of Pryor, and 21 percent said they had an unfavorable opinion of him.
For Hutchinson, 55 percent had a favorable opinion and 30 percent had an unfavorable opinion.
In the August poll, Pryor got a 60 percent favorable rating and 19 percent unfavorable. Hutchinson got 53 percent favorable, 31 percent unfavorable.
Measuring the candidates' support by political philosophy, Hutchinson wins with conservatives 54 percent to 37 percent.
Pryor wins with moderates 57 percent to Hutchinson's 29 percent, and with liberals 81 percent to 17 percent.
In a measure of party support, Hutchinson wins with 81 percent of Republicans to 13 percent for Pryor.
Pryor wins with 77 percent of Democrats supporting him compared to 12 percent for Hutchinson.
Independents say they would vote for Hutchinson, 45 percent, over Pryor, 36 percent.
Among white collar workers, Hutchinson gets the edge with 48 percent to Pryor's 44 percent. Pryor has a wider margin with blue collar workers who support him 52 percent to Hutchinson's 39 percent.
Among retirees, Pryor also has the most support with 54 percent to Hutchinson's 32 percent.
Hutchinson, according to the poll, is popular with voters whose annual incomes are above $75,000, with 58 percent supporting him to 30 percent for Pryor.
For those earning less than $25,000 a year, Pryor gets 64 percent to Hutchinson's 22 percent.
According to the poll's support levels by annual income brackets:
—Pryor leads 49-41 percent, $20,000-$30,000.
—Pryor leads 44-43 percent, $30,000-$40,000.
—Pryor leads 61-34 percent, $40,000-$50,000.
—Pryor and Hutchinson are tied 47-47 percent in the $50,000-$75,000 bracket.
Not good news. The realist in me is just about ready to concede that Hutchinson is going to lose. Even if we accept the Zogby results as being more accurate, we still have an incumbent polling well below 50%.
If you want on or off my poll ping list, let me know!
Maybe there is a true anti-incumbency thing going on as Toricelli and Wellstone look like they are going down too.
I agree. We've only seen one poll so far suggesting the race is this close. Even Strickland's own recent polling had him down by two points (translation: he was really down by more than two points). I'm not saying the race isn't close, but I'm not going to panic until I see another independent poll corroborating Zogby's results.
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