ConservativeHome's Survey blog

New poll: Conservative voters still like Perry after last week's debate, though Romney has surged

Ryan Streeter
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Among active conservative voters, Rick Perry is still looking strong one week after his widely-panned debate performance. Mitt Romney has seen a significant boost, while Michele Bachmann’s attacks on Perry in the debate didn’t do much to slow her downward slide.

In the latest Daily Caller-ConservativeHome poll, which was fielded September 13-16, 2011, Perry’s numbers on electability held fairly constant from August and kept him atop the field, but it was Romney who arguably had the best month.

Perry’s percentage held steady at 46%, while Romney rose from 19.8% to 34.4% since August. We excluded Sarah Palin and Paul Ryan from the poll this month since the latter has said he’s not running, and Palin has not signaled her intentions clearly enough to warrant keeping her in the mix.

When it comes to the candidate respondents say would be their first choice, the results look like this for the top six: 

Gingrich’s numbers are interesting. Lots of commentators thought he did well on the debate stage. Apparently, a fair number of voters did, too. One thing is clear: leaving Palin and Ryan out of the poll did nothing for Bachmann, who comes off as the biggest loser while her peers all fared much better.

We also asked who voters thought would do the best job on economy.

Romney is clearly the winner here. He has come off well in the past few debates when talking about the economy. Voters noticed. Cain's numbers also suggest his 9-9-9 plan and its rollout have gotten through to voters. Last month, Paul Ryan was 3rd on this question, so it appears that Romney and Cain have scooped up his supporters the most.

The poll was conducted among 671 conservative Republican voters, who are part of the Republican Panel, assembled for ConservativeHome by YouGov.

“Take away my loopholes!” Two out of three conservative homeowners are willing to give up their mortgage interest deduction for lower tax rates

Ryan Streeter
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In our latest poll of conservative voters nearly two-thirds support losing their mortgage interest deduction as part of broader tax reform that lowers tax rates.

Sixty-five percent of all respondents support such a reform package. The figure is only slightly different among homeowners: 64% of respondents who own a home say the same.

The question specifically asked:

If tax rates were lowered to three brackets – 8%, 14%, and 23% - would you support eliminating the mortgage interest deduction as part of a larger tax reform effort that got rid of most deductions?

The brackets were taken from the economic growth plan that Jon Huntsman introduced and which was praised by the Wall Street Journal editors. The rates are roughly consistent with, but lower than, the President’s fiscal commission’s recommendations.

This is an important finding for a few reasons:

First, Obama talks a lot about getting rid of the loopholes on the rich, while mainstream voters, most of whom are not rich, are willing to lead by example. Perhaps the best approach is to call on all Americans to embrace reform rather than demonize wealthier Americans, which foments resentment and does little to aid growth.

Second, all voters – including conservatives – have been reluctant to embrace specific entitlement reforms that put them at an apparent disadvantage, such as raising the retirement age or changing the inflation formula for benefits. But on the mortgage interest deduction, which is the single biggest benefit in the tax code enjoyed by middle class homeowners, they are resoundingly supportive of reform that takes an advantage away from them so they can capitalize on a greater advantage: keeping more of their income. There are lessons in this for how to communicate the reality of entitlement reform. Voters don’t yet see that the trade-off is a better long-term gain for them on that front.

Third, note that the question didn’t propose capping the deduction, but eliminating it. Most realistic reform proposals would likely end up capping the deduction. A full elimination is a much bigger hit on families, and yet they still support it.

The poll was conducted between September 13-15, 2011 among 648 self-identified Republican voters, assembled for ConservativeHome by YouGov.