Just in time for Halloween, the latest Field Poll brings some scary news for marriage equality supporters. But the results might also create a well-founded sense of foreboding among those who oppose marriage equality and want to write their views into the California constitution.
The poll indicates the Proposition 8 race has tightened considerably. Support for the constitutional amendment still hasn’t reached the 50% mark, but opposition has dropped to 49%.
Moreover, the 5-point gap between the 44% of likely voters who support Prop. 8 and the 49% who oppose it is now within the poll’s margin of error of +/- 3.3 points. In other words, the true proportion of YES voters in the population could range as high as 47.3% and the true number of NO voters could be as low as 45.7%. About 7% of likely voters are still undecided.
In an extended analysis of the Field Poll, Prof. Gregory Herek reviews the survey’s findings concerning which segments of the California electorate support and oppose Prop. 8, and which arguments for and against the measure hold sway. He also discusses the role of antigay prejudice in making the ballot measure race so close a contest.
The No on Proposition 8 campaign in California, now the most expensive ballot initiative in US history, has set up a program whereby anyone in the country can sign up to call voters there to try to secure a no vote and preserve the right of same-sex couples to marry.
Doug Jennings, who is taking off a semester from the University of Utah to coordinate the call campaign, got 37 volunteers back home in Salt Lake City to call 3,500 voters and identify 500 no voters. “It was our largest action outside of California for the campaign,” he wrote in an email.
Jeff Kent, who played second base for the Los Angeles Dodgers this season, has stepped into the emotional world of same-sex marriage, giving $15,000 to backers of the California proposition on Tuesday’s ballot that would ban it.
In a disclosure filed with the California secretary of state, Kent listed his occupation as professional baseball player for the Dodgers and his address as Austin, Texas. He gave the $15,000 in a transaction dated Monday but which only now is public.Jeff_kent
According to a new Field Poll Proposition 8 is opposed by a plurality of likely voters (49%), with 44% supporting it. The poll, whose results were reported on October 30 on the 10 pm KTVU newscast, has a margin of error of 3.3 percentage points, which means that these figures represent a statistical tie.
Under a state law enacted in 1996, it is illegal for same-sex couples to marry in Arizona. The law has been upheld by the state’s courts, and there is no visible movement — among voters or lawmakers — to overturn it.
Nonetheless, Arizonans on Tuesday will be asked to vote for the second time in two years on a proposal to amend the state’s Constitution to bar same-sex marriage. A similar ballot measure was rejected in 2006….
Backers of the Arizona measure have raised more than $7 million to promote it, with major financing coming from Focus on the Family Action, the conservative Colorado organization that is also backing a ballot measure in California that would reinstate that state’s ban on same-sex marriages….
The opponents have raised less than a tenth of the money raised by supporters, a gap they say may have to do with the amount of national money pouring into the fight over the California measure, which is expected to be one of the most expensive ballot measure campaigns ever….
Websites of political groups fighting anti-gay marriage amendments in California and Florida were hit by a flood of fake traffic Wednesday, in an apparent attempt to muzzle the sites and interfere with a fundraising effort, California’s No on Prop 8 group said Thursday.
The Secret Service is now investigating the denial-of-service attack on NOonprop8.com, an attack that began Wednesday afternoon and eventually made the site unreachable that evening, according to spokeswoman Julia Spiess.
No on Prop 8 described the attack as “what appears to be a coordinated attack designed to bring the system down.”…
The attack came right after the group issued a fund raising appeal ahead of the final weekend before Tuesday’s vote….
The speaker at a Tuesday Yes on Proposition 8 rally compared the fight against marriage equality to the fight against Hitler.
According to Shane Goldmacher at the Sacramento Bee, the video — posted to YouTube by the No On Prop 8 campaign — features Brad Dacus, the president of the Pacific Justice Institute.
In the video, Dacus proclaims, “There was another time in history when people, when the bell tolled. And the question was whether or not they were going to hear it. The time was during Nazi Germany with Adolf Hitler.”
Then, after a long interlude, he concludes, “Let us not make that mistake, folks. Let us hear the bell! Vote on Proposition 8!”
According to an Associated Press check of California campaign finance records, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has donated $200,000 to support Proposition 8, the constitutional amendment to eliminate the right to civil marriage for same-sex couples.
Another Catholic group, The Knights of Columbus, are the largest institutional donor to the Yes on 8 campaign. They have donated $1.4 million.
The NO on Prop 8 campaign has launched a new Spanish language television ad featuring America Ferrera, Tony Plana and Ana Ortiz, three prominent actors currently starring in the hit television show “Ugly Betty.”
In a CNN interview with Campbell Brown, former NBA star Charles Barkley stated his support for marriage equality and his distaste for the GOP’s evangelical Christian leaders.
Brown: You, there has been a lot of polarizing rhetoric on both sides, frankly throughout this campaign. You yourself have called the evangelical base of the GOP fake Christians.
Barkley: Well, because they are so judgmental. And you know what is really interesting about that? I was actually defending John McCain when I said that, because they were saying when he first got nominated that he is not part of the evangelicals. You got to respect Sen. McCain. What I meant by that and I still stick by it — my idea of religion is we are supposed to encourage people to love other people. I am a big pro-choice guy. I am a big gay marriage guy and they are so divisive and that is not my idea of religion. My idea of religion is we are supposed to bring people together. We are not supposed to judge other people….