This month we revised a series of questions from our July 2008 poll where we tested voters if they knew which party control various branches of government: Congress, Governor, NC House and NC Senate.
The good news, the numbers are getting better. The bad news, it's still pretty bad.
Which party controls Congress?
Democratic – 77% (+26 from July 2008)
Republican – 9% (-10)
Not Sure – 14% (-16)
Looks like the November elections did provide at least some clarity at the Congressional level about who is in charge.
Governor's office?
Democratic – 69% (+8)
Republican – 12% (-2)
Not Sure – 18% (-7)
Perdue's election provided some increased recognition about who is in control, but still 3 out of 10 voters don't know either that she's a Democrat or the Democrats are in charge.
NC House
Democratic – 50% (+1)
Republican – 11% (-6)
Not Sure – 39% (+4)
Only half of voters know the Democrats are in control. If you figure that the 11% of people who said Republican, guessed and got in wrong, an equal number probably guessed and got it right, so the real percentage of voters who know the Democrats are in charge is closer to 40%.
NC Senate
Democratic – 50% (+10)
Republican – 12% (-3)
Not Sure – 37% (-7)
So it's gotten considerably better in the Senate, an increase of 10 points since July, but still only half got it right. And remember, we poll people who have voted in at least 1 of the last 3 General Elections, so it's not like we're randomly sampling the population here, these are actual voters who don't know what's going on.
Is it that people don't pay attention to the NC General Assembly, the media does a poor job of covering it? Or a bit of both?
Full release and crosstabs here.
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