Gallup: Romney Won Debate 72-20

Last week I related that, according to a CNN poll, 67% of people who watched the debate last Wednesday thought Romney won, while only 25% thought Obama won.  Today Gallup reports an even bigger Romney win:

Those who viewed the debate overwhelmingly believe Romney did a better job than Obama, 72% to 20%. Republicans were nearly unanimous in judging Romney the winner. But even Democrats rated Romney as doing a better job than Obama, 49% to 39%.

(Emphasis added.)

As with the CNN poll, I can say again with this one:  Not to put too fine a point on it, Romney did better than anyone else ever:

Across all of the various debate-reaction polls Gallup has conducted, Romney’s 52-point win is the largest Gallup has measured. The prior largest margin was 42 points for Bill Clinton over George H.W. Bush in the 1992 town hall debate.

Romney’s debate performance is also notable from the standpoint that U.S. debate watchers judged Obama the winner of all three 2008 debates with John McCain.

(Emphasis added, link in original.)

Unlike CNN, Gallup doesn’t say how far back its debate polling goes.

Gallup downplays the results a little bit:

These assessments are based on interviewing conducted Thursday and Friday after the Wednesday night debate, and may reflect the impact of news stories and media commentary — which mostly declared Romney as the debate winner — as well as personal reactions to the debates as they unfolded.

However, again, this was a poll only of people who also actually watched the debate.

Meanwhile, how has the reaction to the debate influenced the polling on the presidential race itself?  Correlation doesn’t necessarily imply causation, but Romney appears to be enjoying a significant bump in the polls.

• According to Gallup (same Web page), the race went from 50-45 (Obama’s favor) before the debate to a 47-47 tie after the debate.

• According to Real Clear Politics’ polling averages, Romney has cut Obama’s lead by two thirds in national polls, from 49-45.7 (3.3-point lead for Obama) the day before the debate to 48.3-47.2 (1.1-point lead for Obama) today.

• Real Clear Politics also shows Romney gaining on Obama in key swing states.  E.g., in Colorado, Obama enjoyed a 3.1-point lead the day before the debate; now they’re tied.  In Ohio, Romney was down by 5.5 points the day before the debate; as of October 5th (most recent RCP average available as of this writing), Obama was up by only 3.

As always, take any poll with a grain of salt.  Ultimately the only poll that matters is the one on November 6th.

 

Edit (October 8th, 2012):  Hat tip to the Glenn Beck program.

 

Related entries:

• “Romney 1, Obama 0”

• “Postscript to the Debate: Odds and Ends”