SurveyUSA: Bush Approval Soars

One month after posting an approval rating in Texas of just 40%, with 58% disapproval, President Bush rebounded in SurveyUSA’s monthly tracking poll to 47% approval, 50% disapproval. Here are the numbers for Bush, Governor Perry, and senators Hutchison and Cornyn:

Bush:
47% approve
50% disapprove

I have been a big defender of SurveyUSA’s methods (automated calling), but these numbers are so out of sync with the rest of the country and with other polls that I think they should be disregarded entirely.

Rasmussen Reports, which does daily tracking of the president’s national approval rating, shows him with 39%/59% today, and with right around 40% during the period SurveyUSA was conducting its poll.

SurveyUSA also reported the results in 15 other states. You can see how out of step the Texas results are:

Alabama: 42/55. This is the highest approval rating for Bush in any state polled other than Texas.
California: 34/61
Iowa: 34/63
Kansas: 38/60
Kentucky: 37/61
Massachusetts: 25/73
Missouri: 40/58. The only other state in which Bush reached 40%.
New Mexico: 31/66
New York: 24/72
Ohio: 36/62
Oregon: 33/65
Virginia: 39/60
Washington: 30/67
Wisconsin: 34/64

Clearly, the Texas results are an anomaly. Nothing in the course of events suggests why the president’s approval rating should improve by 7 points in one month.

Rick Perry’s numbers remained pretty constant from January to February:

January
Approve: 45%
Disapprove: 52%

February
Approve: 44%
Disapprove: 50%

The disapproval rating is the lowest since last July. What’s interesting about Perry’s numbers is that he has been extremely visible during the past month, with his inaugural address, his State of the State speech, his executive order that young girls must be vaccinated against cervical cancer, and his proposal to sell the lottery, not to mention a flurry of other initiatives, and yet his numbers hardly budged. One interpretation is that Perry has been around so long that most Texans made up their minds how they feel about him long ago. Another is that Perry’s proposals (particularly concerning the vaccination program) generated strong feelings on both sides, which more or less canceled out.