Rasmussen polled those likely to participate in the Iowa Republican Caucus by telephone, finding that Perry is currently the activists’ first choice with 29 percent. U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney are essentially tied for second place with 18 percent, while U.S. Rep. Ron Paul holds 14 percent. No other candidates rose above the 5 percent mark.

One month ago, prior to Perry officially joining the race, Bachmann and Romney were Iowa frontrunners, Paul was third and Perry ranked fourth.

The telephone survey, conducted on Aug. 31, polled 862 likely Iowa Republican caucus-goers, and has a 3 point margin of error.

The poll found that Perry has 45 percent support among those who self-identify as part of the tea party movement, and that Romney holds a slight 20 to 24 percent lead among those who do not.

Perhaps most importantly, however, is the fact that only 27 percent of all likely Iowa caucus attendees reported being certain of who they would support. As Rasmussen states, “That leaves plenty of room for opinions to shift, particularly if new candidates enter the race.”

The Times reports that tea party protesters who showed up at a Pinellas County Commission meeting to oppose “$15 million in future spending for land for affordable housing and a proposed increase in the tax rate for emergency medical service” carried signs that included slogans like, “Say No to Social Justice.” #

According to the Times, “they left behind yellow stickers on doors printed with a message: ‘Government FOR the people, not AGAINST the people.’” #

The Times adds that protesters called “the spending unnecessary” and said it catered to “special interests”: “Glenn Pav, a host on WGUL-AM 860, compared the housing funding to a United Nations ‘usurpation of our state and local government.’ Others said the money would pay for ‘winter homes’ or ‘illegal immigrants’ or a ‘redistribution of wealth.’” #

Rasmussen Reports released a poll Tuesday saying that a “national telephone survey finds that 49% of American Adults now think government programs increase the level of poverty in the United States, while just 20% say they decrease the problem.” #

The poll adds that “while 68% of Republicans and 60% of adults not affiliated with either major political party think government programs increase the level of poverty in America, just 20% of Democrats agree.” #

It also points out that “Florida and Missouri have already passed measures that require some form of drug testing during the welfare application process, with Florida now requiring all applicants to be tested.” #

In late June, Gov. Rick Scott signed a piece of legislation that requires all welfare recipients be drug tested, a decision that Rep. Corrine Brown, D-Jacksonville, called a major “violation of privacy.” #

According to the latest Rasmussen Reports poll, “even as the Obama administration moves to slow the pace of deportation for illegal immigrants, voters continue to believe strongly that gaining control of the border is more important than legalizing the status of undocumented workers already living in the United States.” #

“The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey of Likely U.S. Voters shows that 61% say gaining control of the border is most important when it comes to immigration reform, while 31% say it’s more important to legalize the status of the illegal immigrants who are already here.” #

The Rasmussen poll adds that 83 percent of Republicans and 63 percent of independent voters say “border control is the top priority of any immigration reform effort,” while 54 percent of Democrats say that “legalizing the status of the illegal immigrants already in this country is more important.” Ninety percent “of Tea Party members put border control first, compared to 53 percent of non-members.” #

Republican elected officials have voiced their opposition to the changes that would implement prosecutorial discretion that takes into consideration criteria such as the length of a person’s stay in the U.S. and his or her criminal record, as well as if the person is pregnant or a primary caretaker, has served in the military or has ties and contributions to the community. #

Rep. Peter T. King, R-N.Y., chairman of the Committee on Homeland Security, and Rep. Candice Miller, R-Mich., said in a written statement, “This new non-enforcement policy announced by the Obama Administration Thursday is a blatant attempt to grant amnesty to potentially millions of illegal aliens in this country, and is totally unacceptable.” #

The conservative site Newsmax wrote that Rep. Allen West, R-Fort Lauderdale, called for a “House investigation into the deportation proceeding guidelines announced last week.” Newsmax adds: “In an interview with Newsmax.TV, he accused Obama of ‘shredding the constitution’ with the new guidelines. ‘It is a form of amnesty and it does go against our Constitution and it very much concerns me because now we are rewarding people for an illegal activity,’ he said.” #

“Think about the strain that is going to come on the types of services and things that we have to provide,” West said, according to Newsmax. He said aliens are getting “a free pass.” #

According to Latino Decisions, which conducts research on and polls of the Latino electorate, “a majority of [Latino] voters (53%) said they know someone who is undocumented, while one-fourth (25%) said they know a person or family member who is facing deportation or who has been deported.” #

According to a new survey by Rasmussen Reports, just 30 percent of likely U.S. voters think the border with Mexico is even somewhat secure, while 64 percent disagree and say it is not secure. The survey comes during the same week that president Obama delivered a speech touting his administrations border security and federal immigration law enforcement achievements, and arguing it is now time to begin more comprehensive immigration reforms. #

Obama called on Republicans to focus on comprehensive immigration reform. Republicans, including U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, called for more enforcement. U.S. Senate candidate Adam Hasner wrote: “Under President Obama, illegal immigration continues, our Southern border is still not secure, enforcement of current immigration laws has decreased, and our system not only fails to discourage illegal immigration, but actively rewards those who break the law with government benefits.” #

The poll suggests the political climate favors those, including congressional Republicans, who argue the current administration has not done enough to tighten border security. #

Rasmussen has been accused in the past of conducting polls designed to lend support to positions favored by the GOP.  For example, one of the poll’s questions is worded as follows: #

Most voters say securing the border is a higher priority than addressing the status of illegal immigrants already in the country. Is the border now secure enough to begin dealing with the issue of illegal immigrants already living in the United States? #

Rasmussen’s results themselves have generally proven reliable, despite objections from Democrats (at least prior to the 2010 elections, where their results were found to be “biased and inaccurate”). However, polling experts have expressed skepticism about the wording of their questions, as well as the timing of their surveys, which sometimes seem to “dovetail with conservative media narratives,” as this one apparently does. #

The survey  also indicates that over 50 percent of Democrats believe the southern border is secure, while 86 percent of Republicans and 65 percent of independent voters disagree. The survey of 1,000 likely voters was conducted on May 11-12. #

By some measures, border security has clearly gotten tighter in recent years, under both the Obama and Bush administrations. There are now over 20,700 active border patrol agents a historical high, 85 percent of them on the Mexican border. In 2010 the Obama administration had deported more immigrants per year than George W. Bush. And the White House 2012 budget proposal calls for increased spending for federal immigration enforcement agencies. #

The new Rasmussen health care poll found that 47 percent said they were for repeal of the health reform legislation, compared to 42 percent in favor of continuing to implement the program. This is far below the numbers found in earlier versions of the same Rasmussen poll, in which up to 63 percent of Americans said they believed health care reform should be repealed.

Rasmussen has come under fire in the past over allegations that its results are consistently skewed toward a conservative ideology. After the November elections, its pre-election polls were found to have put Republican candidates an average of nearly 4 percentage points above the vote tallies they ultimately received. This analysis includes the Hawaii Senate race, where there was a 40-percentage-point difference between Rasmussen projections for a close race and actual results — incumbent Democrat Daniel Inouye coasted to victory.

If the new health care poll is an accurate barometer of public opinion regarding reform, it’s unclear what caused the sudden drop in opposition in the week between April 23 and 29. One possible answer lies in the U.S Supreme Court’s April 25 refusal to fast-track Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli’s legal challenge to health care reform. The public, to the extent that it was aware of the Court’s decision, may have taken it as a sign that “Obamacare” repeal is losing traction. The Rasmussen poll didn’t go into the details of why people’s opinions were starting to change.

A simpler answer, however, may just be that Rasmussen, despite those allegations of conservative bias, is merely getting closer to reality in its most recent poll than it has in the past. In January, an AP poll found that opposition and support for health care reform were on approximately equal footing among the American public.

Results then showed 40 percent of Americans in favor of continuing health care reform, a number in line with what Rasmussen has reported. But the same poll indicated that just 41 percent were opposed to health care reform, well below 58 percent, the January high reported by Rasmussen. Meanwhile, the AP poll had just around one in four Americans saying they wanted outright repeal, a far cry from Rasmussen’s results.

On Monday, a group opposed to federal health care sponsored an email from Rasmussen Reports containing survey results showing that people oppose federal health care. On Tuesday, Rasmussen sent out another of its “Daily Updates” — this one containing neither polling data on federal health care, nor advertisements for the Health Care Compact Alliance.

As the Texas Independent has previously reported, HCCA is a 501(c)4 nonprofit led by Sam Adams Alliance CEO Eric O’Keefe of Chicago and construction mogul Leo Linbeck III of Houston. HCCA is pushing for states to implement interstate “health care compacts” to supplant federal health care — an idea that can be traced back to former Texas Solicitor General Ted Cruz, writing for conservative think tank Texas Public Policy Foundation.

Picking up on Monday’s Texas Independent story, an editor for progressive website Daily Kos writes, “Rasmussen apparently isn’t even trying to appear non-partisan, any more.”

According to the Rasmussen survey, 58 percent of respondents favored repealing federal health care reform, with 36 percent opposing repeal. Those numbers are consistent with results of Rasmussen surveys on the topic since March of 2010, with support for repeal ranging from 50-64 percent, and opposition to repeal ranging from 32-44 percent.

The Daily Kos editor contrasts Rasmussen’s results with those from a poll from the Kaiser Family Foundation, showing that 39 percent of respondents favor repealing the law and 51 percent either want to keep the law as is or expand it. Another Daily Kos story notes that 53 percent of KFF poll respondents were “confused” about federal health care reform.

In Tuesday’s “Daily Update” from Rasmussen, the polling firm included survey results on low approval of congressional incumbents, negative perceptions of the economy, ebbing concerns about Japanese radiation and a generic congressional ballot. The advertisements on the email are for books by pollster Scott W. Rasmussen and for Pulse Opinion Research, Rasmussen’s venture based in Arlington, Texas.

Advertisements for the Health Care Compact Alliance, whose leadership includes Houston construction mogul Leo Linbeck III, are plastered all over Monday’s email from Rasmussen, containing the results of two surveys, one showing that nearly 70 percent of respondents are “Still Angry At Government’s Current Policies” and one showing that 58 percent “Now Favor Health Care Repeal.”

Read the Texas Independent for previous reporting on the Health Care Compact Alliance.

The email also links to a commentary written by The Washington Examiner’s Michael Barone touting conservative policies in Texas and other states as the reason for rapid population growth in those areas, compared to states such as California.

In the column, titled “The Eyes of Texas Are Sparkling in the 2010 Census,” Barone writes:

“California for the first time in its history grew only microscopically faster than the nation as a whole (10 percent to 9.7 percent). Metro Los Angeles and San Francisco increasingly resemble Mexico City and Sao Paulo, with a large affluent upper class, a vast proletariat and a huge income gap in between.

Public policy plays an important role here — one that’s especially relevant as state governments seek to cut spending and reduce the power of the public employee unions that seek to raise spending and prevent accountability.

The lesson is that high taxes and strong public employee unions tend to stifle growth and produce a two-tier society like coastal California’s.”

On the contrary, a 2008 study by the left-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities showed income inequalities in California and Texas to be comparable. In terms of income ratios (calculated by dividing the average family income of high earners by that of middle- or low-income earners), California ranked 8th among the states when comparing the top quintile to the bottom quintile, 3rd when comparing the top quintile to the middle quintile, and 9th when comparing the top 5 percent to the bottom quintile. A ranking of 1st would signify the state had the most income inequality.

Texas, meanwhile, ranked 9th, 5th and 11th in those categories, respectively.

In the mid-2000s, the bottom quintile in California on average earned $18,312 (in Texas, $16,088); the middle quintile earned $50,981 (in Texas, $44,574); the top quintile earned $145,358 (in Texas $126,658); and the top 5 percent earned $243,386 (in Texas, $211,038).

In both California and Texas, income for high-earners increased at a faster rate than income for low- or middle-earners, both when looking at changes from the late 1980s to mid 2000s, and changes from the late 1990s to mid 2000s.

That breaks down a little differently when talking about race and political party affiliation.

About 47 percent of Democrats said America is going the wrong way, compared with 83 percent of Republicans and 70 percent of voters not affiliated with either major political party. Being Republican is claimed by 31.1 percent of Americans, while 34.3 percent consider themselves Democrats.

Among black voters, 63 percent believe the country is moving in the right direction, compared with 71 percent of white voters and 72 percent of all other voters.

Among “mainstream voters,” 80 percent think the country is going the wrong way; while 64 percent of “political class voters” (politicians, policy advisors, and those very aware of politics) believe the U.S. is heading in the right direction.

The poll, conducted by national telephone survey the week ending Feb. 27, demonstrated a 1-point rise in voter confidence compared with the previous week. However, 39 percent of those surveyed said they “strongly disapprove” of the president’s performance, a point higher than the previous month. According to Rasmussen, the president’s disapproval rating has wavered between 37 and 44 percent since July 2009.

What the polls numbers pointed to:

• Most voters (53 percent) want to see the national health care law repealed and are confident that repeal will happen. However, belief that repeal will be good for the economy has fallen to its lowest level ever, to 38 percent.
• Most voters (58 percent) prefer a partial federal government shutdown over maintaining current spending levels.
• Most voters(58 percent) fear political unrest in the Middle East might lead the U.S. into participating in another war.
• Most voters (58 percent) want to end foreign aid to all Arab nations in the Middle East (Egypt is the second-largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid). A little over 50 percent favor continuing foreign aid to Israel.
• Most Americans (61 percent) say it is unlikely that all U.S. troops will be out of Iraq by the end of the year, as planned.
• About 36 percent of voters rate the president’s handling of national security issues as “poor”; 40 percent give him good marks.

About 42 percent of all likely voters give Congress a poor grade: 37 percent of GOP voters said Congress is doing poorly, which is down from 55 percent a month ago. Only 13 percent of Democrats and 11 percent of independent voters rate Congress as good or excellent.

According to the poll, Vitter would receive 54 percent of the vote and Melancon would receive 33 percent.

Things don’t look good for Melancon, even after Vitter weathered a number of high-profile controversies, most recently when a top aide resigned over domestic violence and drunken driving charges.

Dave Westlake probably is a nice guy, and I wish him well. But there is no way that two out of three likely Wisconsin voters know enough about him to have an opinion of him (unless Rasmussen provided other information, such as party). And that’s what the favorable/unfavorable question is intended to produce — information about the person’s name identification and image.

I asked Scott Rasmussen to respond. “I think it’s funny,” he said, “that some people like to pick at the details rather than focusing on the overall accuracy of our work.”

Rasmussen’s full answers after the jump:

We ask favs after the ballot question. So, the little known candidates get a lot of very “somewhat” fav or unfav depending upon which party they’re in.

That’s the reason we emphasize the Strong opinions in our stories.

We ask favs after the ballot question for two reasons. First, the ballot question is most important. Second, most people may not know the names of challengers even on election day. But they have an opinion along the lines of “Oh yeah, that’s who’s running against Senator so-and-so.”

I think it’s funny that some people like to pick at the details rather than focusing on the overall accuracy of our work.

It’s also interesting that people fail to note other aspects of our polling. For example, in the Rothenberg article, he claims that Daggett underperformed all the polls. Actually, we nailed the NJ race (we showed Dagget with 8 and he got 6). It was the operator-assisted polls that showed Dagget with a bigger number.

Another example is in Nevada where our latest polling shows the most favorable result for Harry Reid.