Public Policy Polling, a noted and widely-followed polling firm, said Wednesday it made a “rare decision” last week to not release poll data predicating anti-gun Colorado state Senator Angela Giron would lose her recall election.
“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,” director Tom Jensen wrote on the firm’s blog.
“In a district that Barack Obama won by almost 20 points I figured there was no way that could be right,” Jensen added. “It turns out we should have had more faith in our numbers becaue [sic] she was indeed recalled by 12 points.”
Democratic state Sen. Angela Giron hugs a crying supporter after giving her concession speech after she lost in a recall vote in Pueblo, Colo. , Tuesday Sept. 10, 2013. Two Colorado state lawmakers who backed gun-control measures in the aftermath of the mass shootings in Colorado and Connecticut last year have been ousted in recall elections. (AP)
Colorado voters decided Tuesday evening to recall both Giron and Democratic Senate President John Morse after their support for stricter gun control laws earlier this year.
But that’s not to say the firm doubted all of its polling data. Jensen said PPP “didn't find the gun control measures that drove the recall election to be that unpopular.”
In short, PPP believes Giron must have lost for a reason other than gun control because Colorado’s new laws aren’t that unpopular.
“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 wrote. “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.”
He said those numbers don’t square with Giron being recalled by a 12-point margin.
And here’s another interesting bit of information presented by PPP: voters in Giron’s district have a favorable opinion of the National Rifle Association by a 53/33 margin.
Jensen went on to argue that the NRA helped defeat Giron by making it about gun rights as a whole and not about the “pretty unobtrusive” anti-gun laws she helped pass.
The NRA “won the messaging game and turned it into something bigger than it was -- even if that wasn't true -- and Giron paid the price,” he said.
It's worth noting that although Jensen cites the NRA's superior messaging tactics, anti-recall advocates outspent recall supporters by a whopping 7 to 1 margin.
The NRA must have really, truly excellent messaging skills.
A spokesperson for PPP didn’t immediately return TheBlaze’s request for comment.
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