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Explaining Specter’s dip in the polls

The latest Rasmussen poll shows Republican Senate candidate Pat Toomey leading Senator Arlen Specter by 12 percentage points in a 2010 matchup. Analysis of the poll suggests that Obama’s health care bill is swaying voters towards Toomey. In the analysis, it is suggested that Washington’s health care bill is losing its favorability among Pennsylvania voters, turning them against Specter. While the health care debate is currently a great determinant, there are many subtle factors—including a deliberate Toomey campaign strategy—that affect Specter’s favorability ratings.

The poll shows a complete turnaround for Toomey. Before the health care debate began, Specter led Toomey by 11 percentage points. Now, Specter is a front spokesman for the reform efforts, which are opposed by 53 percent of respondents and supported by 42 percent. The Rasmussen poll was conducted during a week when Specter drew heavy media attention during a contentious town hall meeting, suggesting that the numbers could reflect a temporary dip in response to recent events.

But respondents’ votes are clearly associated with each candidate’s stance on health care. Seventy percent of voters who like the emerging legislation favor Specter and 82 percent of those who oppose it favor Toomey.

From the polls, it is clear that Toomey’s critique of Washington’s health care bill has earned him political points since June. His criticisms paint the reforms, perhaps unfairly, as legislation that will cost America its jobs, as Pennsylvania’s private health care industry moves public. Those who accept Toomey’s logic, which is likely to contain some serious flaws, would see supporters of the bill as tragically leading America towards more economic uncertainty and pain.

But there are also other issues affecting the public’s favorability ratings of Specter. When Specter switched parties, there was talk that he would become a loyal Democrat, voting with Democrats 100 percent of the time. Toomey picked up on this fear of conservative voters and worked it to his advantage by alienating moderate and conservative Republican voters from Specter, voters who may have been swayed at one time by Specter’s careful dance on the moderate line. Democrats, meanwhile, viewed Specter as a candidate who had not yet lost his loyalty to Republicans.

It seems, however, that Specter’s moderate Republican voting strategy has not changed much since he became a Democrat. On the Web site, www.specterscorecard.com, which tracks Specter’s progressive votes, Specter is shown to have either voted against or worked to derail two progressive bills since switching parties in April. Some believe that Specter worked behind closed doors to suppress the card check provision of the Employee Free Choice Act, while Specter simply said that he was “relieved” to see that the provision was no longer going to be seen in the full bill.

Many forces are at work behind Specter’s dip in favorability besides his stance on the health care bill. Loyalty is certainly one critical factor, predictability seems to be something that works against Specter in the polls. His contentious position as fore spokesman for the health care bill has given him negative press and perhaps worked against him as well. His support for the bill may also reinforce the image that works so well for Toomey’s campaign, that Specter is a moderate Republican turned Democrat loyalist. Toomey’s deliberate campaign strategy (see Toomey’s Hypocrisy Alert) paints Specter as an extreme liberal who will be the Democrats 60th vote in the Senate. Specter seems to have trouble fighting the accusation and seems to be at his best when he says that switching parties has not changed him much at all.

August 14, 2009 at 11:28 am

--Kenneth Elder

Tags: Arlen Specter, Pat Toomey

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