Obama Continues to Gain In Texas (big swing)

[cali]

by kath25
Fri Feb 01, 2008 at 09:45:43 AM PST
Obama has cut Clinton's lead in Texas from 34 to 10 points in the span of seven weeks.

In the first post-Edwards poll of Texas voters, Obama has picked up significant momentum, particularly among Latino/a voters. These gains seem to represent more a shift of support from Clinton to Obama, however, rather than a direct movement from Edwards to either Clinton or Obama. More below.

kath25's diary :: ::
Barack Obama has continued to make sizeable gains into Hillary Clinton’s lead in the Lone Star State. Results are from polls of previous Texas Democratic primary voters conducted by IVR, an automated telephone polling company. They are the only company consistently polling in Texas, to my knowledge.

Primary Polling in Texas by IVR
1.31.08 1.10.08 12.11.08
Obama 38% 28% 17%
Clinton 48% 46% 51%
Edwards n/a 14% 15%
Undecided 10% 10% 6%


Over the past seven weeks, that amounts to a 24-point swing in Obama's favor, and Obama is poised to keep gaining on Clinton as election day nears in March 4.

Obama’s recent gains have come from Latino and Latina voters. Obama has substantially increased his support amongst Latinos over the past two months. Latino/a voters originally polled 70-7 for Hillary in December; that advantage is now down to 60-29 Hillary. Obama leads African-American voters 55-21.

As usual, Obama also enjoys a very significant advantage amongst younger voters, who favor him by a 28-point margin. Conversely, Clinton leads over-60 voters by 28%, with middle-aged voters split evenly. Note that Edwards’ past core support was from middle-aged white males, so this is another voting bloc up for grabs. In this most recent poll, Obama gained 8 points from white voters, whereas Clinton gained only 5.

Overall, the pollsters indicate that Obama has picked up twice as many votes as Clinton here in Texas over the past three weeks. This is a huge increase, and coupled with Obama's national gains and the extra time before our Texas primary, things are looking strong for Obama.

A few Texas election specifics: There are 193 pledged delegates up for grabs in Texas, and a total of 35 "superdelegates." Texas has open primaries. One does not even register as a member of a party—it is voting in that party’s primary that makes one a Democrat or Republican. Or so says the county official who came to register all of my students to vote today. Early voting begins February 19 and runs through February 28, and the official primary date is March 4. There is a defacto primary in the Senate race, though Noriega has no real challengers anymore. There are also a few House primaries, including one for Dan Grant in TX-10, the district between Austin and Houston, the race rated as the best opportunity for a Democratic pick-up in Texas this year.

A few other notes: on the issues, Texans of both parties are very concerned about the economy, though as expected we see sharp differences in the two parties’ opinions of global warming (guess who just doesn’t care!) and on troop levels and troop reductions in Iraq.

Again, Obama has picked up twice as many votes as Clinton here in Texas over the past three weeks.

Let’s keep this momentum going! If you’d like to get involved, please contact Texans for Obama. They’re working really hard to help Obama pick up as many delegates as possible down here.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/2/1/124543/1892/437/447045

[Adelante]

1. Boy, I have to calm myself

And remember the only poll that matters is an election. But, hot damn!!

[flpoljunkie]

2. Si se puede!

[Avalux]

3. Whoa! That is encouraging! Doing my part here in South Central Texas.

:hi:

[Reciprocity]

4. Kick.