PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) – Many Americans associate Southern New England with the devout pilgrims who settled here in the 1600s, but a new poll shows the region’s religiosity is waning four centuries after the Mayflower arrived.

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• Related: Study: RI has 3rd-most baptisms, remains most Catholic state (March 12)

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) – More than half of Rhode Island voters support allowing same-sex marriage in the state, while most opponents of the idea say it conflicts with their religious beliefs, according to a new poll released Thursday by Brown University.

The poll also found Gov. Lincoln Chafee’s approval rating is a dismal 26%. ”Lincoln Chafee still has not been able to move his numbers after over two years as governor,” WPRI 12 political analyst Joe Fleming said.

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The Public Policy Polling survey [pdf] shows Raimondo would win anywhere from 32% to 46% of the vote depending on which hypothetical opponents she faces. She is the only candidate to crack 40% support in any of 10 ballot tests conducted by PPP.

If Raimondo is out of the picture, however, there’s no clear frontrunner: the leading candidates in non-Raimondo scenarios shift between Republican Brendan Doherty, Republican Allan Fung and Democrat Angel Taveras depending on the match-up. Moderate Party founder Ken Block starts out with double-digit support in most scenarios, suggesting his presence could have a major impact on the outcome.

Independent Gov. Lincoln Chafee faces an unsurprisingly uphill battle to win a second term, with more than half of voters saying they don’t want him to run again. His strongest shot at re-election comes if he runs as a Democrat: running under the party banner, Chafee starts out trailing Republicans Doherty and Fung by just four points. Among voters who do want Chafee to run again, 20% say he should run as an independent and 18% say he should run as a Democrat.

The automated telephone survey of 614 Rhode Island voters was conducted Jan. 28 to 30 by Public Policy Polling, a Democratic-affiliated firm in Raleigh, N.C., that was widely praised for its accuracy in last November’s election. The margin of error is plus or minus 4 percentage points overall and 5.5 points on questions that were asked only of 320 Democratic primary voters.

PPP will release a second round of results on Friday concerning federal questions, including U.S. Sen. Jack Reed’s standing ahead of his 2014 re-election bid.

In a Democratic gubernatorial primary that includes Chafee, Raimondo gets 35% support, followed by Chafee at 22%, Taveras at 19% and Almonte at 11%. Another 12% of Democratic primary voters are unsure. Raimondo and Taveras both benefit if Chafee doesn’t run in the primary, with Raimondo rising to 44% and Taveras rising to 35%.

The silver lining for Chafee: his job approval rating has inched up to 33%, compared with the 22% he scored a year ago, though 59% still disapprove of his performance. However, PPP said its polling shows he’s the second most unpopular governor in the country, behind only Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn.

“Lincoln Chafee is really in a hole,” PPP President Dena Debnam said in a statement. “He managed to win in 2010 because of a splintered field but even that wouldn’t put him across the finish line at this point.”

The other potential candidates for governor are viewed positively overall: Taveras is on top with a 63% favorable rating, followed by Raimondo at 57%, Fung at 55% and Doherty at 45%.

The poll results will cheer supporters of same-sex marriage: 57% of Rhode Island voters say gay nuptials should be allowed in the state, while only 36% say they should not. Only 13% of voters say there should be no legal recognition of a gay couple’s relationship, while 31% would prefer civil unions over marriage.

Rhode Islanders will vote next year on whether the state should hold a constitutional convention, and at this early date 40% of voters say they support having one while 25% oppose doing so and 35% aren’t sure. Similarly, 46% of voters say they support the 2011 pension law championed by Raimondo, while 20% oppose the law and 34% aren’t sure.

In the secretary of state’s race, the lion’s share of Democratic primary voters don’t have a favorite candidate yet: Party Chairman Ed Pacheco gets 15% and Newport Democrat Guillaume de Ramel gets 8%.

Here are the poll results for all the potential general elections for governor tested by PPP:

• ​Raimondo​ 32%
• ​Doherty​ 28%
• ​Chafee [I]​ 22%
• ​Block​ 8%
• ​unsure​ 9%

• ​Doherty​ 31%
• ​Taveras​ 26%
• ​Chafee [I] 23%
• ​Block​ 10%
• ​unsure​ 10%

• ​Raimondo​ 35%
• ​Fung​ 23%
• Chafee [I] 21%
• Block 10%
• ​unsure​ 12%

• ​Fung​ 26%
• Taveras 26%
• Chafee [I] 20%
• Block 13%
• unsure 14%

• ​Doherty​ 39%
• Chafee [D]​ 35%
• ​Block​ 13%
• unsure 14%

• ​Fung​ 36%
• Chafee [D] 32%
• Block 16%
• unsure 15%

• ​Raimondo​ 44%
• Doherty 32%
• Block 10%
• unsure 14%

• ​Raimondo​ 46%
• Fung 27%
• Block 12%
• unsure 14%

• ​Taveras​ 39%
• Doherty 35%
• Block 13%
• unsure 13%

• Taveras 37%
• Fung 31%
• Block 15%
• unsure 17%

And here are the scenarios tested with Democratic primary voters only:

• Raimondo 35%
• Chafee 22%
• Taveras 19%
• Almonte 11%
• unsure 12%

• Raimondo 44%
• Taveras 35%
• Almonte 9%
• unsure 13%

• Pacheco 15%
• de Ramel 8%
• unsure 77%

• Related: Chafee raised $92,000 for re-election bid in fourth quarter (Jan. 31)

While there’s no doubt the issue remains controversial, polling suggests House lawmakers will be acting in line with public opinion if it approves gay marriage today.

Last September, a WPRI 12 poll showed same-sex marriage enjoys significant support among Rhode Islanders, with 56% of voters in favor of legalization, 36% opposed and 8% unsure.

Support for same-sex marriage is fairly broad among different types of voters, with one exception: Republicans. Rhode Island GOP voters are the only group that has a majority against legalization, with 59% opposed (and 40% strongly opposed). Voters ages 60 and older are closely split, with 49% of seniors in favor and 43% opposed.

Unsurprisingly, Democrats and voters ages 18 to 39 are the strongest supporters of allowing same-sex marriage in Rhode Island: 72% of Democrats and 64% of 18- to 39-year-olds are in favor. Nearly half of voters in each group say they’re strongly in favor.

Legalizing same-sex marriage in Rhode Island also has majority support from voters in union households (64%), voters ages 40 to 59 (60%), women (58%), men (54%) and independents (50%). The telephone interview poll with 501 likely Rhode Island voters was conducted Sept. 26 to 29 and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus approximately 4.38 percentage points.

The September WPRI poll is just the most recent to find majority support for same-sex marriage in Rhode Island. Surveys from Public Policy Polling in 2011 and Brown University in 2009 led to similar results.

The polling suggests it’s probably inevitable that same-sex marriage will be legalized at some point in Rhode Island, the only New England state where it’s not allowed, particularly if supporters can capitalize on their advantage in the court of public opinion. Still, it may take longer than one expects at first glance because of the conservative Democrats who control the Senate.

It’s widely known that Senate President Teresa Paiva Weed of Newport opposes same-sex marriage, although she says she won’t block a committee vote this session. Another opponent is Warwick Sen. Michael McCaffrey, who not only chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee but eventually may succeed Paiva Weed as Senate leader. And just this week Paiva Weed’s powerful No. 2, Majority Leader Dominick Ruggerio, co-sponsored a constitutional amendment [pdf] to ban same-sex marriage being pushed by influential Providence Sen. Frank Ciccone, another Democrat.

McCaffrey, who fought off a tough primary challenge from a same-sex supporter last year, says he won’t hold hearings until “sometime in the spring,” telling The Journal: “Obviously, there are more important things than gay marriage to worry about in the state of Rhode Island right now.”

Still, the pressure on Senate leadership to pass same-sex marriage will only grow in the coming years – and their opposition could eventually become a political problem for liberal lawmakers like Cranston Sen. Joshua Miller and Providence Sen. Gayle Goldin, who’ll have to explain to activists in their districts why they empower a leadership team on Smith Hill that blocks a policy which is quickly becoming a core Democratic priority.

​More Nesi’s Notes coverage of Rhode Island’s same-sex marriage debate:

• No guarantee key RI Senate panel will OK same-sex marriage (Dec. 17)
• 2013 could be a big year for same-sex marriage in Rhode Island (Dec. 11)
• Leading gay-marriage opponent Schubert preps for fight in RI (Oct. 10)
• Fox: Gay marriage vote still set for 2013 despite Senate losses (Sept. 12)
• Gay marriage group snubs Kelly despite Jabour’s opposition (Sept. 8)
• Rhoda Perry: McCaffrey is ‘hurtful, inaccurate’ on gay marriage (Aug. 17)
• Is the Rhode Island Senate warming up to same-sex marriage? (May 10)

​(photo: Ted Nesi/WPRI)

The Public Policy Polling survey of 520 Rhode Island voters finds 70% want Reed and Whitehouse to vote in favor of changing the Senate rules “so as to reduce gridlock.” The survey was commissioned by Fix the Senate Now.

Whitehouse has been a staunch advocate along with other younger senators in favor of changing the chamber’s rules to make it harder for Republicans to block legislation. Reed has been more cautious, voting against the proposal last year and taking a wait-and-see approach as momentum grows for another vote in January.

The poll shows 81% of Rhode Island voters think the U.S. Senate does not deal “with important issues facing the country in a timely manner.” Asked about specific changes, 79% said nominees for the judiciary should get an up-or-down vote; 77% said senators should have to keep debating on the floor during a filibuster; and 68% said senators should only be able to filibuster each bill once.

Senator Reed’s spokesman Chip Unruh noted Thursday that there is no formal Democratic proposal for rules changes on the table yet. He said Reed has spoken with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid about the issue.

Greg Sargent, the plugged-in liberal Washington Post journalist, suggested Thursday that Whitehouse and his allies may fail in their latest push. “Real filibuster reform is anything but a sure thing,” he wrote. “It may even be at risk as we speak.”

Public Policy Polling is a Democratic-affiliated firm in Raleigh, N.C., that received high marks for the accuracy of its election polls this year. The automated telephone survey of 520 Rhode Island voters was conducted Dec. 10-11. Full results are here.

So who are those 8%?

“With the undecided voters, there’s no one group where they’re from,” said WPRI 12 political analyst and pollster Joe Fleming after the two of us examined the data from our Oct. 24-27 survey of 300 likely voters. (The margin of error is plus or minus 5.66 points, and larger for subgroups, so caveat emptor.)

One characteristic that does stick out: 11% of women are undecided, compared with only 6% of men. “That could be good for Cicilline because he’s winning that group,” Fleming said. On the other hand, by definition these are women who haven’t been convinced by the Democrat’s pitch so far.

Other than that, the undecideds are a highly heterogeneous group.

Between 8% and 9% of voters in each of the poll’s three age groups – young voters (18 to 39), middle-aged voters (40 to 59) and older voters (60 or older) – are undecided. The group includes 8% of independents, 8% of Democrats and 4% of Republicans.

These Rhode Islanders may be more hesitant than the average citizen to make up their minds: 18% of voters who haven’t decided between Obama and Romney for president also haven’t decided who to support for Congress, compared with only 9% Obama voters and just 4% of Romney voters.

Both side will be spending the final days of the campaign trying to present a message that pushes these voters in one direction or the other – and hope that, if the undecideds break heavily in one direction, they can make up for it with a solid ground game.

• Related: Poll: Cicilline clings to 1-point lead over Doherty (Oct. 30)

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) – President Obama continues to hold a commanding lead over Mitt Romney in Rhode Island with six days to go before voters head to the polls, according to an exclusive WPRI 12 poll released Wednesday night.

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• Interactive: Check out the complete WPRI 12 poll results breakdown

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) – Gov. Lincoln Chafee faces a decidedly uphill battle if he opts to run for a second term in two years, according to an exclusive WPRI 12 poll released Wednesday night.

The survey of 601 likely voters also finds nearly two-thirds of Rhode Islanders think the state is unfriendly to business but three in five are satisfied with the quality of their local school district.

Read the rest of this story »

Coming up at 11 p.m.: Obama vs. Romney in Rhode Island

What better time for a new WPRI 12 poll? Our new survey of 600 likely voters in Rhode Island will be released starting at 6 p.m. tonight with brand-new findings on who’s ahead in the hotly contested 1st Congressional District race between Congressman David Cicilline and challenger Brendan Doherty.

We’ll also have new poll results for president (Obama vs. Romney), U.S. Senate (Whitehouse vs. Hinckley) and the 2nd Congressional District (Langevin vs. Riley vs. Collins). And we’ll share the results of three other questions testing Rhode Islanders’ opinions on the state’s business climate, its K-12 education system and whether Lincoln Chafee deserves a second term as governor.

Check back at 6 p.m. for the first round of results here on WPRI.com and live on WPRI 12.

A survey commissioned by the Republican’s campaign and released Saturday afternoon shows Doherty at 45%, Cicilline at 39% and independent David Vogel at 6%, with 11% of voters undecided. The telephone interview poll of 400 likely voters was conducted Wednesday and Thursday. The margin of error is plus or minus 5.9 percentage points.

The poll was conducted by OnMessage Inc., a GOP consulting firm employed by Doherty’s campaign that previously worked for former Gov. Donald Carcieri. The question is whether it’s accurate. The OnMessage poll’s findings are far from outside the realm of possibility, but there are two reasons to be somewhat skeptical.

First, the firm didn’t release the party affiliation of its voting sample, which is a concern because its Sept. 13-14 poll may have interviewed too few Democrats to accurately capture the district. Second, the poll shows Mitt Romney winning 34% of the vote in the 1st District, which is 7 points better than his showing in the Sept. 26-29 WPRI 12 poll. It’s possible Romney has seen a significant bounce in the staunchly Democratic district over the last month, but far from certain.

The picture should become clearer when the new WPRI 12 poll is released next week. Roll Call’s Joshua Miller has more on the OnMessage survey. Separately on Saturday, Cicilline’s campaign sent out a recorded phone call with Bill Clinton endorsing Cicilline to 50,000 voters in the district. Listen here.

• Related: GOP to spend $280K on TV push (Oct. 26) | Dems counter GOP with $315K ad buy (Oct. 26)

The survey results combine findings from two groups of interviews conducted almost a week apart, the first done from Sept. 26 to 29 and the second done from Oct. 4 to 5, according to Marion Orr, the professor who oversees Brown’s polling. “We did two consecutive sets of days,” Orr told WPRI.com.

Asked whether the poll included cell phones as well as landlines, Orr said the call list was created using phone numbers that some Rhode Islanders voluntarily write down on the official voter registration forms they file with the secretary of state’s office.

A breakdown provided by Brown shows the 496 survey respondents identified themselves as 45% independents, 37% Democrats and 10% Republicans, with an additional 6% of voters classified as “other” and 3% who didn’t know or didn’t say. As a comparison, the 501 voters surveyed in last week’s WPRI 12 poll were 40% independents, 41% Democrats and 17% Republicans, with another 2% who refused to say.

The Brown poll’s gender breakdown was 50.2% female and 49.8% male, and its age breakdown was 10% under 30; 18% ages 30 to 44; 31% ages 45 to 60; 28% ages 61 to 74; and 11% ages 75 and older. Orr said the university trains and pays undergraduate and graduate students to conduct the survey interviews.

• Related: Cicilline leads by 6 points in new Brown poll; Republicans trail (Oct. 10)

This post has been expanded.

A Brown University survey released Wednesday morning shows Cicilline at 46%, Doherty at 40% and independent David Vogel at 7%, with another 7% of voters undecided. Brown’s findings mirror the results of last week’s WPRI 12 poll, which showed Cicilline at 44% and Doherty at 38%.

The survey also shows Democratic Congressman Jim Langevin ahead by 18 points in the 2nd District. Langevin is at 49%, Republican Michael Riley is at 32% and independent Abel Collins is at 5%, with 14% undecided. Incumbent Democrat Sheldon Whitehouse has a 29-point lead for U.S. Senate, with Whitehouse at 59%, Republican Barry Hinckley at 30% and 12% of voters still undecided.

Brown said the telephone survey of 496 registered Rhode Island voters was conducted over 10 days, from Sept. 26 to Oct. 5, and has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.4 percentage points on statewide questions. Brown said the survey sample for the races included 236 likely voters in the 1st Congressional District and 235 likely voters in the 2nd District, with a 6.3-point margin of error for district-only questions.

The poll contains good news for most of Rhode Island’s leaders, with job approval ratings improving since February for all of them except Langevin, whose approval fell from 47% to 41%, and House Speaker Gordon Fox, whose approval fell from 26% to 18%, which makes Fox the state’s least popular politician.

Approval ratings spiked the most for Whitehouse, who jumped from 30% in February to 45%; Cicilline, who went from 15% to 30%; President Obama, who improved from 40% to 55%; and U.S. Sen. Jack Reed, who rose from 47% to 59%. Governor Chafee’s approval rating is a dismal 29%, though that’s up from 22%.

The most popular politician in the Brown poll is Providence Mayor Angel Taveras, who recorded a stellar 66% approval rating statewide, up from 60% in February. Behind him is Treasurer Gina Raimondo, whose 59% approval rating was basically unchanged since last winter.

The survey also found higher approval ratings for Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts (38%), Attorney General Peter Kilmartin (36%) and Senate President M. Teresa Paiva Weed (26%). Secretary of State Ralph Mollis’s approval rating was unchanged from February at 29%, the same as Chafee’s.

In the presidential race, the Brown poll shows Barack Obama at 58% and Mitt Romney at 32% in Rhode Island, with 10% of voters undecided. The survey also finds 77% of voters disagree with the Cranston schools’ recent decision to effectively ban father-daughter dances in the district.

Rhode Islanders remain deeply dissatisfied with the state’s economy, which has been struggling with double-digit unemployment for three and a half years: 93% of voters described Rhode Island’s economy as poor or not so good, while 81% said the same about the U.S. economy. They felt better about their own personal situations, with only 38% of voters describing their personal finances as poor or not so good.

In addition, 61% of voters say Rhode Island is on the wrong track against 16% who say the state is heading in the right direction; 55% approve of Obama’s handling of the economy; and more than half say they’ll vote to allow table games at the state’s two gaming facilities.

• Related: A closer look at the methodology of the Brown University poll (Oct. 10)

Breaking from two decades of tradition, this year’s election exit poll is set to include surveys of voters in 31 states, not all 50 as it has for the past five presidential elections, according to multiple people involved in the planning.

Dan Merkle, director of elections for ABC News, and a member of the consortium that runs the exit poll, confirmed the shift Wednesday. The aim, he said, “is to still deliver a quality product in the most important states,” in the face of mounting survey costs.

The decision by the National Election Pool — a joint venture of the major television networks and The Associated Press — is sure to cause some pain to election watchers across the country. …

Here is a list of the states that will be excluded from coverage: Alaska, Arkansas, Delaware, District of Columbia, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Kentucky, Louisiana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, West Virginia and Wyoming.

Comparing this list with the election map, reveals how carefully the exit poll planners allocated resources. All 19 of the states with no exit polls are classified as either “solid Obama” or “solid Romney,” and there is only one “toss-up” gubernatorial or U.S. Senate race not on the list: the competitive North Dakota match-up of Heidi Heitkamp and Rick Berg.

Nesi’s Notes will be draped in black on Election Day.

But it took many more calls than that to get a representative sample of the district’s voters – more than 5,000 calls when all was said and done, according to Fleming. “You need the right age groups,” he said. “At the end of it, you may be asking for a male or somebody who’s 18 to 39″ – that is, the people hardest to track down.

That’s important because any poll’s results are only as reliable as the people who took the survey. It’s especially tricky with a primary, where only about 25% of registered voters turn out to the polls, he said.

Luckily for us, nobody in Rhode Island has more experience getting polls right than Joe Fleming. He’s been with WPRI 12 since 1984, and still recalls making waves with bygone surveys such as one that put DiPrete and Sundlun in a dead heat.

I’m betting the results dropping at 6 p.m. will cause a similar stir when we release it on TV and online.

• Related: Exclusive WPRI 12 Poll: GOP’s Doherty has big lead over Cicilline (Feb. 27)

We’ll have the answer Wednesday when we release the results of an exclusive new WPRI 12 poll. Democratic primary voters in the 1st Congressional District weighed in on whether they plan to vote for Cicilline or Gemma, how they feel about the two candidates, which one is more electable and how Cicilline’s apology tour is going.

Tim White and I will have the complete poll results online and on air Wednesday at 6 p.m. and 11 p.m. The survey of 302 likely Democratic primary voters in the 1st District was conducted last Tuesday through Saturday by our pollster, Fleming & Associates, and its margin of error is 5.7 percentage points.

• Related: Exclusive WPRI 12 Poll: GOP’s Doherty has big lead over Cicilline (Feb. 27)

The poll shows Congressman David Cicilline 15 points behind Republican challenger Brendan Doherty. “I think this means if he’s going to win this race, he’s not going to win it pretty,” Duffy, a Rhode Island native, said of Cicilline. “It is going to be among the ugliest races Rhode Island has ever witnessed.”

And considering the state’s political history, “the bar’s pretty high there,” she added.

Cicilline’s allies think he can to close the gap and defeat Doherty by following the strategy employed by Sheldon Whitehouse to defeat then-Republican Lincoln Chafee in 2006 – basically, say that even if the former state police superintendent is a moderate himself, he’ll provide a key vote to empower congressional Republicans who’ve supported privatizing Medicare.

But Duffy isn’t sure that will be enough. “If that’s the strategy it might work, but I think it’s going to take a lot more than that,” she said. “I get this argument, and they’re counting on this obviously being a strong Democratic year, this being a strong year for the president. But I’m not sure so sure that that assumption is operative.”

Two numbers stuck out most to Duffy in Monday’s poll: Cicilline is losing to Doherty in union households by a 29-point margin and is only winning 54% of Democrats. That puts him in far worse shape than Whitehouse, who’s also on the ballot this year and is ahead by 36 points in union homes and winning 75% of Democrats.

“These are just not encouraging numbers for an incumbent in a district with a 15-point Democratic advantage,” Duffy said. “That union test ballot really just reinforces my belief that right now Cicilline is just tagged with every Providence problem.” Headlines about Providence filing for bankruptcy likely haven’t helped Cicilline, either, she said.

Duffy said she has “no idea” what the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee makes of Cicilline’s numbers, which could imperil the party’s chances of gaining 25 seats in November to win back control of the U.S. House.

“I know that these parties work very hard to protect their incumbents,” Duffy said. “They stay with their incumbents. But they’re also realistic, and if somebody starts looking like they’re on life support I think a couple of things could happen.”

A spokesman for the DCCC, Josh Schwerin, said in an email: “We are a member participation organization whose first priority is incumbents. Congressman Cicilline is fighting to create jobs in Rhode Island and voters will recognize his hard work in November.”

First, Duffy said, Democrats have until the June filing deadline to find a new candidate in the 1st District other than outsider Anthony Gemma. But echoing many Rhode Island Democrats, she said it’s unclear whom the party’s savior would be. (Cumberland Mayor Dan McKee’s name was being widely floated Tuesday.)

Second, Duffy said, “I’ll be interested to see if they start throwing stuff at Doherty to see if they can perhaps move these numbers a little bit and feel better about things, and then they’ll reassess.”

• Related: Doherty among best-funded Republican challengers in the US (Feb. 13)

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) – Rhode Islanders of every stripe are unhappy with Gov. Lincoln Chafee’s performance as he settles into his second year in office, according to an exclusive WPRI 12 poll released Monday evening.

The new survey of 500 registered voters finds just 21% of voters give a positive grade to Chafee, an independent ex-Republican, while 75% give him negative marks. That includes nearly half of voters – 48% – who rate the job Chafee is doing as “poor.”

The widespread antipathy toward Chafee is a stark contrast with how Rhode Islanders view Treasurer Gina Raimondo. The survey shows 56% of voters give Raimondo a positive review.

The poll also finds U.S. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse has a 22-point advantage over his challenger Barry Hinckley, with the Democratic getting 50%, the Republican getting 28% and 20% of voters unsure.

Read the rest of this story »

• Interactive: Complete results from the WPRI 12 poll with cross-tabs

Coming on Tuesday: Should Providence file for bankruptcy? Should Rhode Island allow casinos?

By Ted Nesi and Tim White

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) – Congressman David Cicilline is headed for a double-digit defeat at the hands of Republican Brendan Doherty unless he finds a way to win back a large number of voters by November, according to an exclusive WPRI 12 poll released Monday evening.

The new survey of 250 registered voters in Rhode Island’s 1st Congressional District shows Doherty, a former state police superintendent, would defeat Cicilline 49% to 34%, with 16% of voters undecided. Doherty’s lead over Cicilline has grown by two points since the previous WPRI 12 poll last May.

Cicilline has “moved the needle, but unfortunately for him in the wrong direction,” WPRI 12 political analyst Joe Fleming said. “Clearly, whatever he’s tried to turn it around hasn’t worked to this point.”

Read the rest of this story »

• Interactive: Complete results from the WPRI 12 poll with cross-tabs

Coming up at 10: Whitehouse-Hinckley; approval ratings (Obama, Chafee, Reed, Whitehouse, Raimondo)

Inevitably, some well-meaning folks will take our top-line results and then argue that anything in a range of, respectively, 8.76 points or 12.4 points could be true. If Cicilline is down 5 points, these folks may say the race is a “statistical tie.”

Those folks will be wrong, and here’s why, as explained by Kevin Drum back in 2008 (emphasis mine):

The idea of a “statistical tie” is based on the theory that (a) statistical results are credible only if they are at least 95% certain to be accurate, and (b) any lead less than the MOE is less than 95% certain.

There are two problems with this: first, 95% is not some kind of magic cutoff point, and second, the idea that the MOE represents 95% certainty is wrong anyway. A poll’s MOE does represent a 95% confidence interval for each individual’s percentage, but it doesn’t represent a 95% confidence for the difference between the two, and that’s what we’re really interested in.

In fact, what we’re really interested in is the probability that the difference is greater than zero — in other words, that one candidate is genuinely ahead of the other. But this probability isn’t a cutoff, it’s a continuum: the bigger the lead, the more likely that someone is ahead and that the result isn’t just a polling fluke. So instead of lazily reporting any result within the MOE as a “tie,” which is statistically wrong anyway, it would be more informative to just go ahead and tell us how probable it is that a candidate is really ahead.

Drum then posted this chart, which tells you how confident you can be about different sizes of poll leads based on the size of the lead and the margin of error. So for our poll, you’d want to look at the 4% MoE line for statewide questions, and assume somewhat lower probability than the bottom 5% MoE line for the 1st District questions:

As an example, take our final 1st District poll of 2010. That poll had a margin of error of about 6.2 points, which in this case is literally off the chart. But we can take an educated guess about what a 6% line would say.

In that poll, Cicilline led Loughlin 48% to 42%, giving Cicilline a six-point lead. So we’d look at the 6% percentage-lead box, then go down to the (imaginary) 6% margin-of-error line. Let’s say that box said 83%. Thus, we can say there was an 83% possibility Cicilline was ahead of Loughlin. And, lo and behold, he won by six points a week later.

Update: A smart reader who’s better at math than me writes in to offer another view:

All that I know about margin of error is that a 95% confidence interval means that 95% of the time the actual number lies between the two sides of the value given.

So saying that there is a statistical tie if the CIs of two poll numbers cross over one another may not be gospel; it does mean that the two numbers could actually be the same if not reversed, since there is no for-sure value within the bounds, 95% of the time. Of course, polling being an inexact science, the numbers given may be way off that other 5%, but in all likelihood, that isn’t the case.

I don’t know if you view this as contradicting what you had to say, just that it’s a different way of looking at it.

(chart: Kevin Drum/Washington Monthly)

David Segal did a poll. WPRI 12 did a poll (which we’ll release at 6:00 tonight). And now we’ve learned someone else with a keen interest in Congressman David Cicilline did a poll, too.

Two NN readers separately reported getting calls last week to take a part in a telephone survey by an organization that described itself as something like ”Rhode Island Opinion Research.” That doesn’t ring a bell, so it’s quite possible a different group – The Feldman Group, perhaps? – used it as a nom de plume.

One of the two readers, bless her heart, took thorough notes about the questions, which were asked by “a very professional woman,” though she had some trouble pronouncing “Carcieri,” “Segal” and “Boehner.” After the jump, you can scan the reader’s hastily drafted notes about the survey questions.

- How likely to vote in November 2012 election
- Country Right Direction/Wrong Direction
- Pick 2 – primary concerns for Congressional representative:
jobs/economy
war in Afghanistan
education
retirement/Social Security
health care
taxes
deficit
transportation
illegal aliens

- what more negative influence on politics in Washington:
partisanship
lobbyists and special interests

- Favorable or unfavorable
Obama
Carcieri
Lincoln Chafee
Romney
Cicilline
Nancy Pelosi
Gemma
Taveras
Cianci
Doherty
Whitehouse
Segal

- Cicilline deserve reelection?

- Rate excellent/good/fair/poor
Obama
Chafee
Cicilline
Whitehouse
Taveras

- If election today:
For President:
Romney
Obama

For Senate:
Hinckley
Whitehouse

For Congress
Cicilline
Doherty

- Do you recall what party has majority in US House of Represenatatives – Dem or Rep?

- If Obama wins reelection is it better for Dems or Reps majority in House?

- if Primary in September how certain are you to vote?

- In primary who vote if:
Segal
Gemma
Cicilline

- Who if:
Cicilline
Segal

-Who if:
Gemma
Cicilline

- Read words to describe Cicilline – pick one and say if much better/somewhat better description:
stands up for RI / Stands up for own agenda
Truthful / Dishonest
Visible in the Community / Not visible
Strong / Weak
Out for himself / Cares about others
Cares about Middle Class / cares about rich
best job for Providence as Mayor / did bad job as mayor

- Read positive arguments for Doherty & negative about Cicilline; and then positive messages about Cicilline. Who support?

- Read statements w/ differences in candidates’ (Doherty & Cicilline) positions on various topics – whose position support? or doesn’t matter.
Doherty close to former Gov. Carcieri / Cicilline critical of Carcieri
Abortion
Taxes/Corporate Taxes
Experience
Energy
Vote for Speaker will be Pelosi / Vote will be for Boehner
Public TV & Public Radio
Capital gains tax
Gay Marriage
Tax on Millionaires

- Read summary of Doherty’s positions on issues (basically recap of Doherty positions above) – and asked does raise very serious doubts/serious doubts/no doubts about Doherty candidacy.

- Read series of positive statements about Cicilline job mayor (crime rate down, something about schools, helping middle class families) & then read some negative things about Cicilline as mayor and positive stuff about Doherty.

If election held today – Cicilline or Doherty?
- Give specific reasons why support.

The 1st Congressional District race between Democratic Congressman David Cicilline and Republican challenger Brendan Doherty is already the state’s biggest political battle of the year. The two candidates finished 2011 neck-and-neck in the money race and Doherty’s only obstacle to the GOP nomination – John Loughlin – left the field in January.

Our last WPRI 12 poll, in May, showed Cicilline trailing Doherty by 13 points. There’s been little sign of a comeback for the congressman since then, with last week’s Brown University survey giving him a 15% approval rating and his successor in Providence now saying the capital is nearly bankrupt. Cicilline may face a primary challenge from Anthony Gemma, too.

But there’s a reason top Democrats remain behind Cicilline and political observers refuse to count him out: he’s a dogged campaigner, a prodigious fundraiser and a down-the-line Democrat in a deep-blue state running in a presidential year, while Doherty is a first-time candidate whose few public appearances so far have been so-so.

While the Cicilline-Doherty matchup will likely get most of the ink, other results to keep an eye on include how Gemma would fare against Doherty; whether Barry Hinckley is getting any traction against U.S. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse; how voters feel about Governor Chafee after a year in office; and where Treasurer Raimondo stands post-pensions.

WPRI 12 will release the results of our new poll in four televised installments today and Tuesday starting at 6 p.m. tonight. Here’s what we’ll tell you about this evening:

• 6 p.m.: Cicilline vs. Doherty; Gemma vs. Doherty; approval ratings (Cicilline, Langevin); right track/wrong track
• 11 p.m.: Whitehouse vs. Hinckley; approval ratings (Obama, Chafee, Reed, Whitehouse, Raimondo)

My colleague Brian Curtin has created this interactive results page where you can dig into the results for different demographic groups, and I’ll have articles and analysis here. Don’t miss it.

• Related: Exclusive Poll: Cicilline would lose to Republicans Doherty, Loughlin (May 19)

Political practitioners have long complained about “the science” of surveys that generate job approval ratings by asking voters to rate an official’s job performance as either “excellent,” “good,” “fair”/”only fair” or “poor.” Their argument is that while “only fair” isn’t a huge vote of confidence, it’s not necessarily a sign of out-and-out disapproval, either.

Evidently, Brown disagrees – the university lumps together “excellent” and “good” to create the metric it calls an approval rating. But by digging into the detailed breakdown of the poll, we can take another look at the numbers and what they say about local leaders’ standing among voters.

One way to do that is to strip out three of the four ratings and just look at the share of voters who describe each politician’s job performance as “poor,” which is clearly negative. While that probably understates the level of disapproval, perhaps Chafee (45%) and Cicilline (43%) can take solace that a majority don’t think they’re doing a poor job:

Of course, just looking at “poor” misses other nuances, including the strength of approval. Treasurer Raimondo, for example, is rated “excellent” by 33% of voters, while Cicilline is rated “excellent” by just 2%. Chafee’s “excellent” rating is 6%, only one point below Senator Whitehouse’s.

Then there’s the issue of whether those polled have opinions at all.

Part of why Chafee’s numbers look so stark is because nearly every voter has made up his or her mind about the governor. Only 4.3% of voters answered “don’t know” or “not sure” when asked to grade Chafee’s job performance, just 2.8 points more than the number who said that about President Obama, whom we can all agree is pretty well-known.

One way to deal with that is to create a “weak approval rating” metric by lumping together the share of Rhode Islanders who rate each leaders’ job performance as “excellent,” “good” and “only fair.” Chafee has a “weak approval rating” of 51%, surpassing Cicilline by 11 points:

Combining those three responses burnishes Mayor Taveras even more, giving him a whopping 81% “weak approval rating.” It also brings Senator Reed, usually the bellwether in these polls, up to 75%. It puts Raimondo at 74%, Obama at 70%, Whitehouse at 60% and, intriguingly, gives Speaker Fox an 8-point lead over Senate President Paiva Weed.

Again, it’s important to keep some perspective. Just as looking only at “poor” ratings probably understates disapproval, looking at all three of these ratings together probably overstates approval, because some of those “only fair” responses are likely a negative judgment.

Still, the “weak approval” number may give a useful indication of whether people could be persuaded to vote for an incumbent. As Marc Comtois pointed out on Twitter, “in Rhode Island, where the power of incumbency is very important, it seems more realistic” to take a nuanced view of the “fair” rating when analyzing the poll.

In the governor’s case, Chafee’s “excellent”/”good” approval rating puts him at an anemic 23%, but adding “only fair” more than doubles that to 51% – not a very good showing, to be sure, but an indication he could have room to grow his support.

The bump for Cicilline by adding “only fair” is much smaller, bringing him to 39%. In the congressman’s case, the question is what the numbers would be if Brown had only surveyed the 1st Congressional District, and how they translate into votes for him versus Republican Brendan Doherty or potential primary challenger Anthony Gemma.

• Related: Cicilline, Chafee approval ratings now worse than Nixon in 1974 (Feb. 23)

Cicilline’s job approval rating has sunk to just 15% among all Rhode Island voters, down from 24% in December, according to a new Brown University poll released Thursday morning. Chafee’s approval rating isn’t much higher at 22%, down from 27%.

To put those numbers in perspective, President Richard Nixon’s approval rating was 24% a week before he resigned over Watergate in 1974. Slightly more voters rated Chafee’s job performance as poor (45%) than said so about Cicilline’s (43%).

Cicilline’s successor, Providence Mayor Angel Taveras, is the most popular elected official in Rhode Island based on Brown’s polling. The mayor’s statewide job approval rating is up to 60%. Treasurer Gina Raimondo comes next with 58% approving of her job performance.

The telephone survey of 514 registered voters in Rhode Island was conducted Feb. 16 to 18 by Brown’s A. Alfred Taubman Center for Public Policy and American Institutions and John Hazen White Public Opinion Laboratory. The margin of error is plus or minus 4.3 percentage points.

Among other federal officials, President Obama’s approval rating among Rhode Islanders is 40%; Congressman Jim Langevin’s and U.S. Sen. Jack Reed’s are both 47%; and U.S. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse’s is 30%. Reed got the highest “excellent” rating, at 15%, while nearly 30% rated Obama and Whitehouse as “poor.”

At the state level, Attorney General Peter Kilmartin’s approval rating is 33%; Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts’ is 32%; Secretary of State Ralph Mollis’s is 29%; House Speaker Gordon Fox’s is 26%; and Senate President M. Teresa Paiva Weed’s is 21%. Raimondo received an “excellent” rating from 34% of voters, far more than any other official polled.

Brown found majority support in Rhode Island for President Obama’s new policy of requiring insurers to provide free contraceptive coverage to women whose religious employers are against doing so. The poll showed 57% of residents back Obama’s new policy, whereas only 48% backed requiring the religious employers to offer birth-control coverage. Support was higher among women.

The poll also showed little support for some of the major proposals in Chafee’s proposed 2012-13 budget, with 80% opposed to raising the meals and beverage tax; 68% against higher DMV fees; 64% against increasing Medicaid co-pays; 57% against raising tolls on the Sakonnet River Bridget; 54% opposed to ending state funding for Rhode Island PBS; and 50% opposed to ending subsidized dental care for low-income adults.

The only budget plank that won majority support is Chafee’s proposal to increase the cigarette tax by 4 cents, approved by 71%. In addition, 56% of voters agree that “the state is responsible for developing a uniform plan to fix the many independent municipal pension plans in Rhode Island,” while 32% disagree. Brown did not ask about Chafee’s proposal to increase education funding.

A whopping 96% of Rhode Islanders rate the state’s economy as “not so good” or poor, with 89% saying the same about the national economy. However, 59% rated their own personal finances as good or excellent.

Just 5.4% of Rhode Islanders described economic conditions in the United States as excellent or good in 2011, the smallest share in any state, according to Gallup polling. That was down from the already minuscule 7% who felt that way in 2010.

Oregon had the second-fewest optimists in 2011, but even they had 7.2%. More than half of Rhode Island residents – 52.9% – described the economy as poor last year, compared with 51% who said so in 2010.

Moreover, Gallup found Rhode Islanders’ confidence about the economy has barely budged in the last three years.

Those responses gave Rhode Island a score of minus-43 in Gallup’s Economic Confidence Index for 2011, tied for third-lowest in the nation. That’s an improvement from the state’s rock-bottom score of minus-63 back in 2008, but worse than its scores of minus-39 and minus-41 in 2010 and 2009, respectively.

“Gallup Daily tracking each day asks Americans to assess the current state of the U.S. economy and to say whether the economy is getting better or worse,” the firm said. “The responses to these two questions are combined into Gallup’s Economic Confidence Index.” Negative scores mean more pessimism.

The most economically confident place by far was Washington, D.C., which registered a minus-4, a full 22 points ahead of second-ranked North Dakota despite the latter’s much lower unemployment rate.

“One possibility is that the poll is wrong,” The Washington Post’s Ezra Klein suggested. “Another is that the political nature of the economic crisis leaves residents of Washington feeling more in control than residents of other states. But the truth is that I don’t have a good explanation for this result. Do you?”

Just 7% of Rhode Islanders described economic conditions in the United States as excellent or good during the first half of 2011, according to a new Gallup poll – tied with Oregon for the second-lowest percentage in any state. About half the state’s residents – 51% – described conditions as poor.

The survey shows Rhode Islanders’ opinions haven’t budged over the past 12 months. The share of Rhode Islanders who described conditions as excellent or good was also 7% in the first half of 2010, and the share who described them as poor a year ago was 50%.

Asked about the direction of the economy during the first six months of this year, 58% of Rhode Islanders said they thought it was getting worse, while only 34% said they thought it was getting better. That was slightly better than a year ago, when 62% said the economy was worsening and 34% said it was improving.

Those responses gave Rhode Island a score of -34 in Gallup’s Economic Confidence Index for the first six months of 2011, which ranked ninth-lowest in the nation. That was essentially unchanged from the state’s score of -36 in the first half of 2010.

The only place in the nation with a positive Economic Confidence Index score for this year was Washington, D.C., with a +11, Gallup said. Massachusetts’ score of -19 was tied for fourth-highest. Connecticut posted a -30.

But all those numbers may be lower now, Gallup chief economist Dennis Jacobe warned. “Economic confidence has worsened considerably during recent weeks and, as such, views over the second half of the year may be quite different from those in the first half,” he wrote.

“Gallup Daily tracking each day asks Americans to assess the current state of the U.S. economy and to say whether the economy is getting better or worse,” the firm said in explaining its methodology. The responses to these two questions are combined into Gallup’s Economic Confidence Index, which has a theoretical range of -100 to +100. Negative scores indicate Americans are more pessimistic than optimistic about the state of the U.S. economy.”

Just 48.9% of Rhode Islanders were “thriving” in 2010, judging by how they rate their lives now and five years from now, according to the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index. That was the fourth-lowest share thriving in the country, behind only Ohio (48.8%), Kentucky (47%) and West Virginia (45.8%).

On a scale of 0 to 10, Rhode Islanders on average rated their lives right now as a 6.8 and in five years as a 7.7. Gallup classifies “thriving” as a current rating of 7 or better and a future rating as 8 or better.

The places with the most residents thriving were Hawaii (65.5%), Alaska (59.5%) and Wyoming (57.7%). Hawaii is also the least-stressed state in the nation, according to Gallup, which said there was “no clear regional pattern” among the states’ thriving scores.

“Americans’ ratings of their lives five years from now consistently exceed ratings of their current lives, both over time and across all 50 states,” Gallup noted. “This suggests that people in various situations – good and bad – tend to express optimism that things will improve in the future.”

Compared with other nations, the percentage of Rhode Islanders who are thriving is on par with Ireland and Venezuela and higher than in Germany or France, according to Gallup’s global wellbeing snapshot.

(map: Gallup)

In 2010, 41% of Rhode Islanders said they’d felt stressed during the previous day, according to the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index. That was the 10th-highest stress level in the country, below No. 9 New Hampshire (41.1%) but above No. 11 Washington (40.9%).

On the bright side, fewer Rhode Islanders felt harried in 2010 than during the previous two years – 42.7% reported being stressed in 2009 and 41.6% reported it in 2008.

Hawaiians were the least stressed in 2010 for the third year in a row, with only 30.2% feeling that way, according to Gallup. Utah residents reported the highest stress level – 45.1% – and Massachusetts was No. 5, at 42.6%. Americans’ average stress level was 39.4%, with the Northeast and West among the higher-level regions.

Here’s how Gallup described its overall findings:

The Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index state data underscore that stress is a complex emotion that is likely related to numerous life issues. …

That finances and health aren’t the only determinants of Americans’ stress levels reveals that earning more money or being in great physical shape doesn’t necessarily protect against all of life’s stressors. Family and career issues likely play a large role in individuals’ daily stress levels.

That stress levels did not increase much during the recession provides additional evidence that Americans’ definition of stress goes beyond economic experiences. Still, further investigation into what drives stress and how stress affects people is needed as nearly 40% of American adults consistently report experiencing it a lot of the day “yesterday.”

(map: Gallup)

Chafee’s net approval rating ranks 28th among the 38 governors tracked by Public Policy Polling, according to figures provided to WPRI.com by the Democratic-affiliated firm. Chafee’s 38% approval and 44% disapproval ratings gave him an overall margin of -6 points.

That’s better than one of Chafee’s next-door governors, Connecticut Democrat Dan Malloy – whose 39%/47% ratings gave him an approval margin of -8 points, ranking him 29th – but worse than Massachusetts Democrat Deval Patrick, whose approval and disapproval ratings were both 45%. Patrick ranked 24th.

Chafee spokesman Mike Trainor said he believes the governor will win over voters as time goes on.

“Governor Chafee – he’s a workhorse, not a show-horse,” Trainor said. “His substantive, measured, methodical approach is going to produce results that I think are going to please an awful lot of Rhode Islanders. But it takes time.”

Trainor also noted Chafee faces big challenges. ”No reasonable person would disagree with the fact that he inherited a colossally difficult agenda,” he said. “His style is to go at things very methodically, very deliberately and substantively. He’s not somebody to put a sugarcoating on anything, and I admire him for that.”

Among the 10 governors whose approval margins are worse than Chafee’s, six are Republicans (Texas’ Perry, Pennsylvania’s Corbett, Wisconsin’s Walker, Michigan’s Snyder, Ohio’s Kasich and Florida’s Scott) and four are Democrats (Connecticut’s Malloy, Washington’s Gregoire, North Carolina’s Perdue and Illinois’ Quinn).

The most unpopular governors are Florida’s Rick Scott and Ohio’s John Kasich, both with approval margins of -23 points. Illinois’ Pat Quinn is right behind at -22. Nebraska Republican Dave Heineman is the most popular governor; his 67% approval and 23% disapproval ratings gave him a margin of +44.

One caveat – these polls were done over a long period of time, so some of the governors could have been caught at particularly high or low points. Chafee’s numbers come from February, while the others range from this month back to January 2010 (though most are more recent than that).

Chafee’s no Jack Reed, anyway. Rhode Island’s senior senator was the most popular Democratic senator in the entire country in 82 Public Policy Polling job approval surveys from January 2010 to February 2011.

But there may be a silver lining for Cicilline in our new WPRI 12 poll – he’ll be sharing the ballot with Obama and Whitehouse in November 2012, so their presence on the ticket could give him a needed boost.

The survey of 300 registered voters by Fleming & Associates was conducted May 13-15 and has a 5.7% margin of error. Here’s how they rated the job performance of the three Democrats:

• Obama: 53% positive / 46% negative / 1% don’t know
• Whitehouse: 46% positive / 47% negative / 7% don’t know
• Cicilline: 23% positive / 63% negative / 14% don’t know

In our survey, “positive” means a voter described the politician’s job performance as “excellent” or “good,” while negative means he or she described it as “fair” or “poor.”

Tim White and I have more – including extended analysis from our political analyst Joe Fleming – in our new story on WPRI.com. Joe will also be taking about the poll this weekend on WPRI 12′s “Newsmakers” along with Tim, WRNI’s Ian Donnis and Scott MacKay, and yours truly.

You can also see the poll results for Cicilline when he goes head-to-head against his two potential Republican opponents here, and check out complete poll results here.

Cicilline would lose to his two potential Republican challengers – Brendan Doherty and John Loughlin – by double-digits if the 1st Congressional District election were held today, according to the new WPRI 12 poll being released on air right now.

The survey of 300 registered voters by Fleming & Associates was conducted May 13-15 and has a 5.7% margin of error. Here are the head-to-head matchups:

• Loughlin: 47%
• Cicilline: 35%
• undecided: 17%

• Doherty: 46%
• Cicilline: 33%
• undecided: 20%

We also got favorability ratings – as opposed to job performance ratings – for each of the three. “I’ve seen surveys where people had very high favorability ratings and very low job ratings – they like them as a person but they don’t necessarily like the job they’re doing,” our analyst Joe Fleming said.

Here’s how those broke down:

• Cicilline: 33% positive / 57% negative / 10% don’t know
• Loughlin: 38% positive / 16% negative / 46% don’t know
• Doherty: 43% positive / 5% negative / 52% don’t know

Tim White and I have much more – including reactions from Cicilline, Doherty and Loughlin’s spokesman – in our complete story on WPRI.com.

At 10 p.m. on Fox Providence and 11 p.m. on WPRI 12, we’ll have more results from the poll – this time testing how Cicilline’s standing in the 1st District compares with Sheldon Whitehouse’s and Barack Obama’s. You can look through complete poll results here. (No Nightcap tonight.)