Iowa Primary Poll Analysis

With less than a month until the Iowa primary, Bill Richardson is currently polling at fourth, behind Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards.

In Iowa, Richardson has been treading at around 8-10% for most of the campaign, while the three front runners hover around 20-30%. He hit a peak in late August at 14% in a Strategic Vision poll, but dropped off (he seemed to lose voters to Obama) and recent numbers have not been favorable: He was only at 4% in an American Research Group poll at the end of November. It should be noted, though, that in a Rasmussen poll taken the same week, he was at 10%. In the weeks since, his poll average has climbed back to the 10% mark.

Richardson has concentrated the majority of his efforts on the Iowa caucus, and has just finished a tour in which he spoke in all of Iowa's 99 counties. Iowa is Richardson's best chance to finish near the top in an early primary. Edwards has all but taken up residence in the state, and his popularity there is huge. This means that the vote at the top, which is usually split only between Obama and Clinton, is actually split three ways--Edwards is within six points of both Obama and Clinton. And so Richardson, even at 10%, is still only 15 percentage points behind the three front runners. If he makes a late push, he could finish third or higher. In an interview with the Quad City Times, Brian Kingsolver, a Democratic Party county chairman in Iowa, said, "He will surprise a lot of people on caucus night. I could see him pulling second (place) or third."

And indeed, polls can be deceiving. According to the same Quad City Times article, Richardson was a 30 point underdog when he first ran for congress in New Mexico--he ended up losing by a very slim margin. He has shown that, even though polls may not show it, he is an attractive candidate and a good campaigner who can make leaps on election night.

Additionally, his opponents may have inflated numbers: Obama, for example, may have to deal with what is known as the Bradley Effect--in essence, people feel guilty telling pollsters that they won't vote for a black candidate, even though they will go on to vote for their opposition. This leads to a spike in the polls that are not indicative of future performance in the actual election.

That's not to say that Richardson wouldn't like to be higher in the polls. But after canvasing Iowa and getting out his message, he could finish higher than predicted and build some momentum going into New Hampshire.

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The Richardson Campus got its first press coverage yesterday on "Blogging Bill," a site created by the staff of the Santa Fe Reporter to track Governor Richardson's campaign. Many thanks to everyone at the SFR for the mention. And yes, I'm due for a haircut.

--Wyndam