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May 25, 2000

Poll: Voters and Donors Agree, Support Campaign Finance Reform

RALEIGH, N.C., May 25 /PRNewswire/ - The North Carolina Center for Voter Education has completed a study which reveals that North Carolina voters and campaign contributors would both support campaign finance reform and publicly financed elections, if candidates agreed to limit campaign spending.

The analysis of the Center's study was released to members of the media and to the North Carolina General Assembly on Thursday morning.

The Center asked a series of questions concerning campaign reform and public financing of elections. Registered voters and campaign contributors, when presented with fair arguments for and against public financing of campaigns, decidedly voiced support for public financing and spending limits.

The survey of 500 registered statewide voters, chosen to be representative of the state's ethnic, gender, political, and geographic population, has a margin of error of +/- 4.5 percent and was conducted May 3-4 by the Tarrance Group of Alexandria, Virginia on behalf of the N.C. Center for Voter Education.

A second survey, also conducted by the Tarrance Group, took place May 16-17 and polled 502 campaign contributors who gave more than $250 to one candidate or party within one election cycle. The Tarrance Group is one of the most widely respected Republican research and polling firms in the nation.

People were read an objective description about a plan to publicly fund political campaigns for candidates who agree to limit campaign spending, then they were read arguments for and against the plan and asked which side they agreed with. Voters supported the plan of public financing and spending limits by a three to one margin, 69 percent to 23 percent.

Campaign contributors, who are often criticized for their role in the rising cost of elections, also agreed with the proposal by a margin of 58 percent to 33 percent.

"Quite frankly, the level of support surprised me," said Center executive director Chris Heagarty. "I thought that there would be support for it, but I didn't expect there to be so much bipartisan support for this issue. Nor did I suspect that campaign contributors would be so eager to change the system, but both Democrats and Republicans agreed that public financing was acceptable if it meant limiting spending."

Heagarty said that one of the reasons for doing the study was that he felt existing polling on the issue was not reliable. "Most of the surveys I have seen have short-changed this issue, asking questions such as 'Do you agree with giving politicians tax-dollars for their campaigns?', which you already know people won't agree with before you ask it. It's like asking 'Do you support a tax increase?' But if you give voters some context, such as 'Do you support a half cent increase in the sales tax to build new schools?' you might get a different answer."

"Some people don't give them a lot of credit, but voters are a pretty smart lot," Heagarty continued. "We knew that if we gave voters some context and background information, then presented them with the pros and the cons, they would arrive at a reasoned position, either for or against it."

The Center also looked at two more questions: (1) whether voters and campaign contributors thought campaign finance reform should be a priority of the legislature and (2) whether candidates who support campaign finance reform would be negatively impacted in their reelection bids.

By a margin of 49 percent to 43 percent, voters said that regardless of other issues, the legislature should make campaign finance a top priority. Campaign contributors, though narrowly divided, indicated that reform should not be a top priority, with 50 percent against and 44 percent who believed it should.

Both campaign contributors and voters were three times more likely to support candidates who support campaign reform than to oppose them. Only 7 percent of voters and 10 percent of campaign contributors said they would be less likely to support a candidate who endorsed campaign reform, compared to the 25 percent of voters and 32 percent of campaign contributors who would be more likely to support such a candidate. The majority of both voters and contributors said that this one issue would not likely make a difference in whom they voted for.

"What this tells us," Heagarty said, "is that if a candidate believes in campaign finance reform, publicly supporting it sure won't hurt them. It won't win an election outright for you, but it could help you with one out of every four voters and one out of every three campaign contributors. In a tight race, that's got to make a difference."

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