Ted Budd on the Rise with a Lot of Room to Grow | Eastern North Carolina Now

Press Release:

    (Raleigh, N.C.)     Ted Budd for US Senate conducted a survey last week and...let's just cut to the chase. Click here for the wonky, smart-guy memo from our pollster, Rob Autry of Meeting Street Insights. Please see the Felts FAQs below courtesy of me, the campaign's nebulous Senior Advisor, for normal person speak.

    Felts FAQs

    Are you winning?!

    Not yet. We're down six points - McCrory-31%, Budd-25%, Walker-16%, Eastman-4%, Undecided-23%.

    POLITICO: HOLY [DELETED]!!!! Y'ALL MUST BE FREAKING THE [DELETED] OUT!!! THIS IS SO GREAT BECAUSE IT TOTALLY FITS THE NARRATIVE WE ARE SO DESPERATE TO BE TRUE!!!

    [Rolling eyes dismissively] Is that a question?

    Politico: Fair point. OK [deep breath]. Are you freaking the [deleted] out?

    No. All good. If the election were today? Sure, maybe a bit of concern. But the election is over two months away and my focus is where are the numbers going to be on Election Day. Budd's numbers are moving up while McCrory's continue to drop. We last polled in June 2021, so that's the point of reference I'm using in these bullets.

• Ballot Test - McCrory lead has dropped from 26-point lead to only a 6-point lead. We're gaining ground, McCrory is losing ground.
• Net Favorability (Fav) Rating - McCrory has dropped from a +44 net fav to only +18. (This mirrors McCrory's own poll in January that showed his net fav at only +20).
• Ted Budd has the best net fav of all the Republican candidates at +30. If you want to use a cliché metaphor, this means a Republican Primary Voter most wants to have a beer with Ted Budd. And McCrory is the guy the same voter actively avoids at a party for fear of being pulled into a conversational black hole that can't be escaped.

    Is that it?

    No. Rob's memo lays it out more in-depth about voter groups. My simplistic explanation is that Ted already has as good as, or better, numbers than McCrory does with pretty much ANY group that will significantly impact the outcome of the Republican Primary. And that's the good news for McCrory. The bad news for him is McCrory can't grow anymore with these folks, but Ted can.

    How so?

    Oh. I totally forgot to mention this earlier. But, despite lamentations to the contrary from the "experts" in DC, President Donald Trump remains by far and away the most popular figure among North Carolina Republicans. And when Republican Primary Voters are reminded that President Trump has endorsed Ted Budd? Whoooo-Boy. The ballot results go to Budd-50%, McCrory-23%, Walker-10%, Eastman-4%, Undecided-13%.

    Politico [sniffs disdainfully and orders another cocktail at the country club]: That can't be right. We have been ASSURED by some of the premier Establishmentarians in Washington that President Trump has zero juice in primaries anymore.

    Again, not a question, but I'll answer anyway. I like our odds. When I say we have room to grow, I mean that only 30% of Republican Primary voters are currently aware of the endorsement. Layer that with publicly available data indicating there's about $10 million or so going to be spent between now and Primary Day in support of Ted Budd and I'm confident we'll get the message out to the right folks and win this thing.

    Does this mean you're just going to rely on an air war and that you don't care about grassroots?

    We love grassroots. And we love winning. That's why Ted Budd for US Senate is the only campaign travelling to events across the state AND raising the money needed for a substantive voter contact campaign AND building robust grassroots operations in all 100 counties (52,000 volunteer phone calls and door knocks over the past two weeks).

    So, you just got this in the bag do you?

    Nope. We have a very clear path to victory, and it's a better path to victory than any of our opponents, but we all know there's still a lot of hard work ahead of us.


   Contact: Jordan Shaw
   OnMessage Inc.
   Email: jordan@onmessageinc.com