The Senate race in Kansas: Crowdfunded poll shows Marshall and Bollier in tight race
A new poll showing Republican Rep. Roger Marshall in a tight race with Democrat Barbara Bollier was crowdfunded by a Tennessee college student hoping to highlight races in red states that he thinks are more competitive than people realize.
The poll of 1,202 likely voters found that Marshall leads Bollier 46 % to 44 %, a lead that falls within the survey’s margin of error of plus or minus 3.3%. It was conducted on August 8 and August 9 by SurveyUSA, a pollster with an A rating on the politics website FiveThirtyEight.
It’s the second poll released since the primary to show Bollier, a state senator from Mission Hills, in a competitive race with Marshall in a state that has not elected a Democrat to the U.S. Senate since 1932.
Marshall held a 1-point lead in a survey conducted by Public Policy Polling, a Democratic-leaning firm, and paid for by EMILY’s List, a progressive group which supports Bollier.
Bollier’s campaign said both polls confirm it is a close race and that Bollier’s “message of independence and moderation” is resonating with voters.
Marshall’s pollster Robert Blizzard disputed the validity of the SurveyUSA poll because it relied on a mixed methodology of recorded phone calls and online sampling.
“What a mess. They don’t even know who they are talking to – it could be some 6 year old pushing buttons,” Blizzard said in an email. “Their analysis is also suspect, given one of their conclusions is ‘Marshall is ahead among the rich. Bollier is ahead among the poor.’ Come on.”
Blizzard’s firm, Public Opinion Strategies, has a B+ rating from FiveThirtyEight.
The SurveyUSA poll was commissioned by Jack Vaughan, a 20-year-old communications and political science student at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and paid for by money raised through the crowdfunding website GoFundMe.
It’s the third poll that Vaughan and two friends have commissioned since July, following surveys in Alaska and Montana.
The idea started as a joke on Twitter, but the GoFundMe for the Alaska poll last month quickly generated enough money.
“We raised the $8,000 for the Alaska poll in about nine hours,” Vaughan said. “There was clearly a demand to do something like this in Alaska.”
Vaughan, a field organizer for the Knox County Democratic Party in Tennessee, said they chose the three states because they are second tier targets for Democrats this election cycle with a dearth of polling because of low population and strong Republican leanings.
“We’ve certainly seen some states ignored by national media and pollsters,” Vaughan said.
Vaughan visited Kansas for the first time last year as part of a road trip to the Iowa State Fair. He has no formal affiliation with Bollier’s campaign, but he said his goal was to bring attention to her with the poll.
“I want people to know that there are many states that are typically written off both in the presidential race and in senate races… I don’t subscribe to the idea,” he said. “I think a state like Kansas has a lot of potential for Democrats.”
President Donald Trump won Kansas by double digits in 2016, but the poll found he only had a 7-point lead on former Vice President Joe Biden.
The poll in Kansas cost more than $10,000, Vaughn said, a significant portion coming from one donor whose contribution enabled the group to double the sample size. It will be the last poll that he organizes this cycle, Vaughn said.
“Working full time, being a student and managing this has been a lot for me, so we’re stopping when we’re ahead,” Vaughn said.
The poll included an inaccurate question about the Kansas Board of Education. It asks respondents if they agree or disagree with Kansas Board of Education requiring school districts to reopen classrooms on August 10.
The board rejected Gov. Laura Kelly’s order to delay schools from reopening, but it did not issue a requirement that they open by a specific date. Many school districts have chosen to delay until after Labor Day to start the school year. Vaughan said he took responsibility for the inaccurate phrasing because he reviewed the questions before the poll was conducted.
The Wichita Eagle’s Jonathan Shorman contributed to this report.
This story was originally published August 12, 2020 at 4:40 PM with the headline "The Senate race in Kansas: Crowdfunded poll shows Marshall and Bollier in tight race."
