Disclosing Party ID: LA Times

Legacy blog posts Weighting by Party

Today I have another response from a public pollster regarding the disclosure of party identification.  I have been asking public pollsters that do not typically disclose the results for the party identification to explain their policy.  Today we hear from Susan Pinkus, director of the Los Angeles Times poll: 

My predecessors usually did not release this information in the press releases unless it was requested and I just followed the precedent.  However, at times, the Times Poll has published party ID figures in poll stories if it was part of the overall analysis.   If someone requests it, of course, we are more than happy to give it to them.  Having said that, the party ID results were so much in the headlines last year, and so contested by the campaigns (depending if they liked the results of that particular poll or not) that I will probably start putting those figures in the poll’s press release — when it is called for (i.e., during election years or is relevant to the survey’s analysis).  Party ID is asked in national polls because of the obvious — not every state is registered by party.  In California, however, voters have to register by party or declined-to-state. In state and local Ca. races, we usually only ask registered voter question and not party ID.

Thank you LA Times

To confirm the willingness of the Times to release party numbers on request:  Those who follow this topic closely will recall that in June 2004 an LA Times poll that showed John Kerry leading George Bush came under attack by Matthew Dowd of the Bush campaign.  He told ABC’s The Note that the poll was "a mess" because it "is too Democratic by 10 to 12 points" (proving that complaints about party identification do not always come from Democrats).  Pinkus responded with a statement and a release of party identification for all polls going back to September 2001. 

There is one more public pollster that I asked for a statement that has not yet responded.  I’ll post that if and when I receive it.

Party Disclosure Archive (on the jump)

Mark Blumenthal

Mark Blumenthal is the principal at MysteryPollster, LLC. With decades of experience in polling using traditional and innovative online methods, he is uniquely positioned to advise survey researchers, progressive organizations and candidates and the public at-large on how to adapt to polling’s ongoing reinvention. He was previously head of election polling at SurveyMonkey, senior polling editor for The Huffington Post, co-founder of Pollster.com and a long-time campaign consultant who conducted and analyzed political polls and focus groups for Democratic party candidates.