April 28 2014

In the US, New Hampshire Governor Maggie Hassan has signed into law a bill clearing the way once again for legitimate political polling in the state, following years in which an over-broad definition of push polling made it almost impossible for researchers to work there.

New Hampshire law has for years required ‘any person who engages in push-polling’ to disclose the sponsor of the call up-front to the recipient. According to MRA’s Director of Government Affairs Howard Fienberg, this ‘was intended to prevent deceptive campaign advocacy techniques …but unintentionally harmed legitimate research by biasing research calls in New Hampshire, distorting research results and making it impossible to accurately reflect the thoughts and opinions of its people.’

Nine months ago, when the state’s Attorney General appealed a decision against the law, some research suppliers had already said they would not conduct political research in the state, and Feinberg said the ultimate result could be to jeopardise the state’s ‘privileged place as home to the first-in-the-nation-Presidential-primary’. Supposed violations cost polling firms Mountain West Research $20,000 in 2010 and OnMessage, Inc. $15,000 in 2012.

The new law, sponsored by Senators David Pierce (D-Lebanon) and Sen. Jeb Bradley (R-Wolfeboro) redefines a ‘push poll’ as a call conducted ‘for purposes other than bona fide survey and opinion research’, but which is made to seem like a survey and is ‘part of a series of like telephone calls’ numbering more than a certain threshold (from 200 for state representative elections to 2,000 for a federal election). The law – S.B. 196 – is the first statute in US law to include a legal definition of bona fide survey and opinion research, developed by MRA in consultation with the broader research profession.

Bradley said the law, which follows more than three years of lobbying by the MRA (Marketing Research Association) and the AAPC (American Association for Political Consultants) would protect business from ‘the threat of prosecution simply for conducting normal opinion research’ and give voters ‘more confidence that the polls they receive are legitimate.’

AAPC is the world’s largest non-partisan professional society for political professionals, including media consultants, campaign managers, corporate public affairs officers, fund-raisers, and pollsters. Web sites of the two organisations are at www.marketingresearch.org and www.theaapc.org .