This morning the Poizner for Governor campaign will announce that their candidate has 72% support amongst conservative tea party activists around California.
To be specific, Marc Harris, one of the leaders of California’s tea party movement has released the results of an survey that he and other tea party leaders undertook — the straw poll was conducted by a combination of telephone (1,417 respondents), and emails forwarded within and among one hundred eighty seven (187) established, grassroots Tea Party groups.
The other twenty-eight percent (28%) broke down as follows: Undecided 18%; Meg Whitman 8%; Other Candidates 2%.
In a similar poll taken in the first week of March, 2010, (sample size: 814) the percentages were: Undecided 53%; Poizner 14%, Whitman 23%; Larry Naritelli 9%; Others 1%.
In conjunction with the release of this "straw poll" of tea party activists, Southern Cal Tea Party leader Harris also released an extensive memo on why he thinks that Poizner is the best candidate for Governor. Of the most interest to me in this memo is that Harris alleges that Whitman would not even meet with him.
The Harris memo is attached below.
June 2nd, 2010 at 12:00 am
Harris also alleges that he is the Southern California Coordinator of the Coalition of California Tea Party Groups.
Interesting how no one has heard of him or whatever this Coalition of California Tea Party Groups is.
The entire content of this article lacks credibility and wreaks of RINO
June 2nd, 2010 at 12:00 am
As one of the California Coordinators for the Tea Party Patriots, and the Co-Founder / National Coordinator for the Tea Party Patriots nationally, I am very uncomfortable with the information in this post.
First of all, though Dawn Wildman (my California Co-Coordinator) and I are in regular communication with close to 200 tea party organizations in California, we are unaware of any “Coalition of California Tea Parties.” This is the first I’ve ever heard of it.
More importantly, the tea partiers in California support many gubernatorial candidates. As we travel the state we’ve heard many talk up Naritelli, Poizner, Nightingale and Miller. Yet as a statewide organization, we have intentionally stayed out of the race, and intend to continue to do so. To the extent that this poll is intended to create the impression that the vast majority of tea partiers support Steve Poizner, that does not ring true to me. Neither Dawn Wildman, my California co-Coordinator, nor I, have heard of this “straw poll.” Each week we have two California Coordinator calls, and we’ve never heard it brought up or discussed on any of these calls. To this day we have no idea exactly who conducted it, how it was conducted or whom it included. Additionally, we believe the value of straw polls in general to be somewhere below zero. They are easily manipulated, generally biased by the make-up of the responding audience, and serve little if any purpose except to justify the opinions of those creating such polls.
We do not believe that the use of such a flawed poll to indicate broad tea party support for the candidacy of Steve Poizner over any other candidate is appropriate. Do tea partiers support Steve Poizner? Surely many do. Do other tea partiers express strong support for other candidates? Yes they do, and in many instances, passionately.
If someone wants to use a poll to support their candidacy, they should commission a real, scientific poll of tea partiers across the state. This attempt to do a very narrow, apparently secret “straw poll” and then allow Steve Poizner to attempt to use it to convince people that 70% of tea partiers support his campaign, smacks of politics as usual. This is not what the tea party movement is about.
To be clear, the Tea Party Patriots as an organization, (and Dawn Wildman and I personally) do not support or endorse any of the gubernatorial primary candidates.
We think any effort to get tea partiers to “tow the line,” or to support a particular candidate because the “majority” thinks a particular way is the old political paradigm, and not what the tea party movement is about. This is how the Republican Party in California operates. Instead, in the new tea party paradigm, we have faith that tea partiers across California and across the nation are educating themselves, and forming their own opinions. They don’t need any “coalition,” individual or organization to tell them what to think. Our job is to help with information, education and empowerment. Beyond that, our job is to step out of the way, and let local organizations, and local tea parties stand and speak for themselves.
None of us has any “extra” wisdom in this regard, and our opinion on who should or shouldn’t be Governor is only as relevant as that of any other self educated tea partier on the ground. We have been truly humbled by their wisdom, integrity and intelligence, and believe that the folks on the ground have the ability to make their own decisions.
Mark Meckler
Tea Party Patriots