She’s already lost her restaurant (see story here). Now a new poll shows her seat in Congress may be in jeopardy, too.
A month from the election, Raw Story trumpets (here) that she’s “dangerously close to being upset by a little-known Democratic rival, as a new poll from Keating Research shows her leading Democrat Adam Frisch by a mere two points.”
Not so fast, Mother Jones says here. “There’s a catch: The poll was commissioned by Boebert’s challenger, Adam Frisch.” And “Keating Research, a Democratic firm, has a B/C rating from FiveThirtyEight, which places Boebert’s odds of winning at 98 percent.”
Mother Jones then throws this in: “All polling should be taken with a grain of salt. Polling from Boebert’s opponent? Add some extra sodium.”
Yeah, all that’s true. Every bit of it. But if you drill deeper, i.e. go to Wikipedia, you find (here) that Keating Research conducted two polls, and they look like this:
| Poll source | Date(s) administered |
Sample size[a] |
Margin of error |
Lauren Boebert (R) |
Adam Frisch (D) |
Undecided |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Keating Research (D)[A] | September 28 – October 2, 2022 | 500 (LV) | ± 4.4% | 47% | 45% | 8% |
| Keating Research (D)[A] | July 21–25, 2022 | 550 (LV) | ± 4.2% | 49% | 42% | 9% |
Do you see what I see? In little over a month, 2% for Boebert and 1% Undecided have migrated to Frisch. Even if the percentages are wrong, two polls by the same polling firm presumably using the same methodology show a trend away from Boebert and undecided to her opponent. It suggests some voters in her district are rethinking their support for her. But why?
To find out, I went to Keating’s explanation (here) of its latest poll. After all, they talked to the voters, so their conclusions should carry some weight. They said, “As Adam Frisch has become more familiar, his popularity has grown,” noting a 15-point jump in his favorability since the July poll. Meanwhile, “Boebert continues to divide voters and her favorability ratings are now underwater,” with her biggest losses among unaffiliated (i.e., swing) and women voters.
I’m certainly not one to obsess over polls; and I’m not saying she will lose, or even that she could lose, all I’m saying is this is interesting.