Results of Final SurveyUSA TX Tracking Poll Released

by: reg

Mon Mar 03, 2008 at 11:31 AM CST

Before the editorializing, the big numbers:

If the Democratic primary were held today, would you vote for Hillary Clinton? Barack Obama? Or some other Democrat?

Clinton - - Obama - - Other
 48%        49%       2%

The first interesting tidbit:

6 hours till votes are counted in the Texas Democratic Primary, contest is a Jump Ball, with Obama's momentum now slowed, and possibly stalled...

This comment seems to be based on tightening margins throughout the poll's tracking, but for those of us on the ground in Texas, there is no indication that Obama's momentum has slowed. While record early vote turnout cannot itself measure support for one candidate, it is certainly a sign that there is tremendous interest and backing for both candidates.

Another interesting note:

For Obama to carry the state's popular vote (convention delegates are not awarded as a straight function of the popular vote), Obama needs to run at least 3 points stronger than Clinton among those who vote at the precinct tomorrow.

Given Senator Obama's history with caucuses, this is certainly an achievable margin. However, the importance of Texas to the Clinton campaign has drawn a surge of Hillary volunteers both from Texas, and from around the nation. At the end of the day, however, numbers may not be able to make up for the superior organization that Senator Obama's campaign has displayed in every caucus contest.

Other takeaways from the poll include:

- The survey breaks up the results into four age groups, and Senator Clinton leads in every one, except those between the ages of 18 and 34. However, her only significant lead is with voters over the age of 65, where she has 22 percentage point lead.

- Among those who responded with a party affiliation, Senator Obama leads among those who identify Republican 60% to 36%.

- Senator Obama also has a significant lead among those that identify themselves as independents: 55% to 41%.

- Among those that identified the economy as the top issue in the election, the candidates split the votes: 49%-49%

- Where Iraq and Terrorism were identified as the top issue in the election, voters overwhelmingly preferred Senator Obama.

         Iraq - - Terrorism
Obama    57%       62%
Clinton   42%       30%

These voters were interviewed Saturday and Sunday, after Senator Clinton had put her new national security ad into play. However, the surveys may be too close to judge the ad's impact, if it has any.

There's more and more to take away from the poll, and I can leave a lot of that to you as you go through the numbers. In case you missed the link above, the full break down can be found here.

UPDATE

I went back to find the previous two SUSA polls, and have noted some interesting trends below the fold.  

In a Democratic Primary in Texas today, 02/18/08, 15 days to the vote, Hillary Clinton leads Barack Obama 50% to 45%

The second poll showed significant movement towards Senator Obama:

In a Democratic Primary in Texas today, 02/25/08, 8 days till votes are counted, Barack Obama moves ever-so-slightly ahead of Hillary Clinton, though at the edge of the margin of sampling error

...

Today, it's Obama 49%, Clinton 45%. Compared to a SurveyUSA tracking poll released one week ago, Obama is up 4 points, Clinton is down 5 points.

For the sake of consistency, I'll stay with the trends on the takeaways I noted above the fold.

All three polls show Senator Obama solidifying his hold on voters ages 18-34, but having lost ground on 36-49 year olds 36 hours from election day.

While I noted Senator Obama's strong lead among independents  in the final poll, that is still a 5 percentage point drop from the first survey. The poll results show Senator Clinton making inroads here.

The most interesting movement, for me at least, are the changes on the issues.

The first poll reflects voters' strong preference for Senator Clinton on a variety of the day's top issues. She has strong leads on the economy, the environment, healthcare, and social security. Yet these leads all but evaporate by the third poll where the voters are generally split between the two candidates on the most pressing issues.

All three polls show Senator Clinton trailing on Iraq and Terrorism. The case that she is more prepared for the nation's national security challenges does not seem to be resonating with Texas voters.

All three polls also show Senator Obama trailing with voters who see health care as the top issue in the election. Texas voters seemingly prefer the universal coverage plan put forth by Senator Clinton.

I could write about these numbers all day, but I don't have that kind of time. I invite you to take a look at the numbers yourself and analyze away.

First poll
Second poll
Final poll