100 Day Sprint: Doheny camp says race close, won’t disclose polls
The Doheny campaign is reacting more fully this afternoon to a Democratic poll released late Wednesday showing that the Republican challenger is down 12 points with roughly three months left in the race.
Matt Doheny, from Watertown, faces incumbent Congressman Bill Owens, a Democrat from Plattsburgh.
“We’ve been polling all along,” said Doheny spokesman Jude Seymour. “We’re showing the polling to be a lot closer than what they’re showing. I think you know that this is a very, very tight race. Our polling is probably within the margin of error.”
Asked to disclose his data, however, Seymour declined, arguing that “the only poll that really matters is the one at the end.”
Campaigns are often reluctant to release polls that show bad numbers for their candidates; and are generally most eager to release surveys when they show positive trends.
Asked whether that’s a factor in the GOP’s decision not to release their polling numbers in the NY-21 campaign, Seymour answered this way:
“Bill Owens is the incumbent. He’s had two years to get to know people and to help people. We have an uphill climb and that’s why we see Matt out there every day. We’re not going to take anything for granted. We don’t think we’re down 12 points. We see it as a much, much closer race.”
Tags: election12
They think they are down less than 12 points, plus or minus. That’s good news for Owens.
In a bizarre and ironic way, the race will be so close that the third party candidate, Donald Hassig, could be a factor a la 2009 and 2010. If he collects 3-4 % of the vote, could that mean a 49-48 victory for ?????? Who does Hassig take votes from? Would those voters have supported one of the other 2 candidates if Hassig wasn’t there? Or would they have stayed home?
Hmmmm…….
Hopefully Hassig won’t garner a significant proportion of the vote. Even some Greens seem to be embarrassed that he is running.