With 3 Weeks to Go, It’s John Bell 47%-David Ramadan 47%

The following memo is from the John Bell for Delegate campaign in the 87th district. Clearly, it’s never easy to beat an incumbent, but hopefully a strong GOTV program and a couple more weeks of talking to voters about the clear difference between the candidates will do the trick. And yes, there are huge differences, given that Ramadan is a Cuccinelli style (see photo) right-wing nutjob (with the usual, horrible votes on everything we care about, according to Project Vote Smart), yet somehow he’s holding down a 57% Obama/Kaine district. On November 5, it’s time to change that! (note: Ramadan won by only 51 votes in the 2011 House of Delegates election, so make sure you vote on November 5!)

Memorandum  

Date: October 14, 2013  

To: Interested Parties  

From: Andrew Myers & Lauren Spangler

Status of the Contest – VA HD87

According to the results of our recent survey of 400 likely November voters, Democrat John Bell and Republican David Ramadan are locked in an absolute statistical dead heat today with both candidates tied at 47 percent apiece.1

The contest is driven in large part by a substantial 12 point gender gap, with Bell leading among women by 6 points, 51 to 45 percent, and Ramadan leading among men by 6 points, 43 to 49 percent. Also of note today is that among moderate Republicans, Ramadan is experiencing serious defections, with one quarter (27 percent) supporting Bell at this stage – troubling news  for Ramadan indeed.

Underscoring the competitive nature of this contest is the fact that the political  environment appears to favor Democrats, unlike the trends two years ago. First off, this survey finds a more favorable generic ballot for Democrats, with a generic Democrat besting a generic Republican candidate for Delegate by 6 points, 47 to 41 percent, which in fact is the most favorable ballot we have seen in this district to date. Further, at the top of the ticket, Democrat Terry McAuliffe leads Republican Ken Cuccinelli by a 7 point edge, 49 to 42 percent. Secondly, though out of Ramadan’s control in this Northern Virginia district – where there are many federal workers – we find that 42 percent of voters say that the federal government shutdown makes them more likely to vote against party-line Republicans, 33 percent much more so, reflective of the intensity of these feelings.

Bottom line, this contest is incredibly ompetitive and is likely to come down to the wire come Election Day, just as the contest here did two years ago.

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1 These findings are based on a survey of 400 likely November general election voters in Virginia’s 87th  House of Delegates District. Calling took place from October 9 – 10, 2013, and interviews were conducted by professional interviewers supervised by Myers Research | Strategic Services staff. The data were stratified to reflect the projected geographical contribution to the total expected vote. The margin of error associated with these data at a 95 in 100 percent confidence level is +/- 4.9 percent. The margin of error for subgroups is greater and varies