Reporting of this week’s UT/TT Poll can’t help but present a simple story: Davis is down, Abbott is up. But these latest results reflect factors that are much more deeply rooted than the low-hanging fruit making headlines and feeding campaign emails.
Joshua Blank
Joshua Blank is the manager of polling and research at the Texas Politics Project. Born in New York, New York, he has a bachelor's degree in political science from Boston University and a master's and doctorate in government, from the University of Texas at Austin.
Posted in
Demographics
The Polling Center: Playing the Right Anglos
In the short run, the GOP appears to be embarking on a winning strategy to mobilize a reliable and larger electorate using the rhetoric that motivates its voters.
Posted in
Politics
The Polling Center: Can Lt. Gov. Candidates Go Too Far on Abortion?
The Republican lieutenant governor candidates’ views on abortion after rape, displayed prominently in Monday night’s debate, may have edged farther right than the Texas GOP’s comfort zone.
Posted in
Politics
Polling Center: Privacy, Partisanship and the Paranoid Style
Everybody is nervous about privacy, and most voters don’t have a high level of confidence in many public and private institutions. But their level of trust has a lot to do with their political alignment, too.
Posted in
Demographics
Polling Center: Major Issues, Poison Pills
Democratic and Republican voters favor many provisions of proposed immigration law reforms and of the Affordable Care Act. But the rhetorical emphasis on unpopular provisions of those policies has made them nonstarters with those same voters.
Posted in
Demographics
Polling Center: GOP Candidates Bet on Border Security
Republican candidates in Texas have figured out how to talk about immigration without stepping on political land mines: They talk about border security instead.
Posted in
Politics
Polling Center: Obama Weighs Heavily on Texas Democrats
There is a reason so many Texas Republicans are mentioning the Democratic president in their commercials: He’s unpopular with Republicans, and moderates and some Democrats have their reservations, too.
Posted in
Politics
The Polling Center: Women Through the Looking Glass
As a group, women have neither followed the March Hare to the Tea Party nor signed up for Wendy Davis’ trip to Wonderland, leaving the campaigns to ponder their place on the electoral chessboard.
Posted inState Government
Polling Center: Cornyn and the Cruz Effect
The state’s senior U.S. senator, up for re-election in 2014, steers warily around the state’s junior U.S. senator, who has been on a roll for the last several months.
Posted in
Politics
The Polling Center: What Early Poll Results Tell Us
The latest UT/TT Poll showing a single-digit lead for Greg Abbott over Wendy Davis in the gubernatorial race raised some eyebrows. Adding some context to a survey taken more than a year before Election Day helps provide some clarity on the results.