Public Opinion Watch October 15, 2003 covering polls and related articles from the week October 6-12, 2003
By Ruy Teixeira
California Screamin'
Field Research Corporation poll of 649 California registered voters, released September 11, 2003 (conducted September 3-7, 2003) Edison Media Research (EMR) exit poll of 4,214 California voters, released October 8, 2003 (conducted October 7, 2003) Los Angeles Times (LAT) exit poll of 5,205 California voters, released October 8, 2003 (conducted October 7, 2003)
Schwarzenegger may be governor, but California remains California and incumbents are in trouble. That's the message Public Opinion Watch takes away from the results of California's recall election.
It's hard to read this election as anything other than a manifestation of anti-incumbent feeling. The voters in California detested Gray Davis and were thoroughly dissatisfied at the situation the state was in. So they voted for the recall. They didn't see Bustamante as representing a change from Davis's administration and business as usual. So they took a chance on Schwarzenegger and voted for him.
Does this mean that Republicans are suddenly competitive in California in 2004? Hardly. Indeed, you could argue that the only shot they had in California in 2004 was if Davis had remained in office and they could have gotten voters to vote Republican in protest against the state's incumbent. But now he's gone and California voters will be free to focus their dissatisfaction on the nation's incumbent-George W. Bush.
And how do they feel about Bush? They are not happy campers. In a recent Field poll, Bush received a 46 percent job approval rating from California's voters, including a 42 percent rating among nonpartisan/independent voters and a 19 percent (!) rating among Democratic voters. Since Republican hopes in California in 2004 must rest on cutting into the Democratic partisan vote and doing well among independents, as both the recall and Schwarzenegger did, this does not bode well for GOP chances.
Or consider the economy, by all accounts a central cause of California voters' desire to toss out Gray Davis. California voters currently give Bush a dreadful 39 percent approval rating on the economy-and that includes pathetic ratings of just 26 percent among independents and 16 percent among Democrats!
These are the voters who supposedly can be induced to vote for Bush in 2004? Pardon Public Opinion Watch for being just a wee bit skeptical. Especially since his other job ratings (except on reducing the terrorist threat) are equally bad. These include 46 percent on foreign affairs, 44 percent on taxes, 40 percent on the situation in Iraq, 39 percent on the environment, 36 percent on health care, 34 percent on energy policy, 34 percent on reducing unemployment, 33 percent on the federal budget deficit, 29 percent on his treatment of matters relating to California, and 28 percent on Medicare.
But what if this election demobilized the Democratic base and mobilized many new Republican voters? Assuming this pattern carries over to 2004, a big assumption, wouldn't that help Republicans in 2004? Public Opinion Watch is not persuaded that this turnout-centered interpretation of Tuesday's results is correct.
First of all, there were few new voters. Only 3 or 4 percent of Tuesday's voters were first-time voters, depending on which exit poll (EMR or LAT) you look at. Second, exit polls do not give clear indications of Democratic demobilization. It is true that the EMR exit poll has Democrats at just 39 percent of voters, compared to Republicans at 38 percent, in a state where Democrats have a 44 percent to 35 percent registration advantage. But the LAT exit poll has different figures-46 percent Democratic and 39 percent Republican-which are not far off the overall registration figures. The LAT poll also has figures available from 2002 (46 percent Democratic/40 percent Republican) and 1998 (48 percent Democratic/39 percent Republican), the last two off-year elections, and they do not indicate much change in Democratic or Republican turnout.
Thus, the voters who turned out don't seem to have changed much, but they certainly were in a mood to "throw the bum out." And in 2004, the bum in question is likely to be President Bush.