GOP pollster give Begich (D) massive lead in Alaska.

[Statistikhengst]

File under: strange development


AK-Sen AK-Gov Hellenthal Associates Oct. 2014


Survey sample: 403 LV.
MoE: +/-4.88 (this is a HIGH MoE)

Begich (D-inc): 48.6 (49)
Sullivan (R): 39.2 (39)
Gianoutsos (I): 3.7 (4)
Fish (L): 2.8 (3)
undecided: 5.7 (6)

Margin: Begich (D-inc) +9.4

Now, this poll does something interesting: it also lists the race, deleting the undecideds, and then it is:

Begich (D-inc): 51.5
Sullivan (R): 41.5
Gianoutsos (I): 4
Fish (L): 3

Margin: Begich (D-inc) +10.

Now, were this a Democratic polling firm, people would probably rolling their eyes and saying, "yeah, right". But this is a well known, well established Republican polling firm, so the data really does come as a surprise. The poll also releases ALL internals. The polling is exactly 50-50 male/female.

There has been a lot of talk about the Begich team's GOTV efforts among Alaskan natives (eskimos - Inuits), and maybe this is showing up some in the poll.

But the aggregate for quite a while has been Sullivan +4, which makes this poll even more surprising.

According to the poll, a majority of Alaskans also support raising the minimum wage and the poll also sees a dogfight in the Gubernatorial between Sean Parnell (R-Inc) and Independent/Unity Ticket candidate Bill Walker, with a +0.8% spread between the two.

This poll could very well be an outlier, but than again, maybe not. Wait and see. But the pollster is well established:

Marc Hellenthal LinkedIn

Been in business since 1979 and also correctly predicted that Lisa Murkowski would win re-election in 2010 as a write-in candidate over Joe Miller:

Encouraging poll results for Lisa Murkowski as campaign enters final week Alaskans Standing Together

Hellenthal's final prediction:

Murkowski (write-in) 43.5
Miller (R-Tea) 29.1
Adams (D) 22.7

Actual results:

http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?year=2010&fips=2&f=1&off=3&elect=0&class=3

Murkowski 39.5
Miller 35.5
Adams 23.5

So, Hellenthal was definitely off on the margin and underestimated Miller's strength, but was not far from Murkowski's topline and also nailed Adam's topline. The poll also correctly picked the winner.

 

[Statistikhengst]

BTW, this is a pretty darned good article over why it is difficult to get accurate polling in Alaska:

Polling a tough and often inaccurate task for Alaska - Fairbanks Daily News-Miner Local News

The last sentence or so is very telling.