Shock CD8 Poll Shows Abe Out Front with Franks and Toma Vying for Second

MILWAUKEE—Yesterday appeared a tweet that blew the minds of everyone following the race for the Republican nomination in CD 8.

According to Chad Heywood, a respected, longtime operative in Arizona with experience in Peoria, “Results for a survey we ran in AZ CD8. Abe Hamadeh 27.7% Trent Franks 21.7% Ben Toma 19.6% Masters was at 9% Kern 7% Briodi 1% The Masters number seems low but I’m hearing he’s running third in most surveys.”

Today, the Arizona Globe got Heywood on the phone to comb over some of the poll’s findings and background.

“When you have 28 days of voting, every survey is a snapshot in time. So I never overread into one survey. But when I made calls to different people, they all told me Masters was running about third. And I called sort of grassroots people in that district, in Peoria in particular. And they all told me, it seemed like Franks and Toma are starting to pick up momentum and Masters had really high negative ratings. So you can tell even from my tweet, do I think Masters is it 9%? No. But, do I think he’s in first or second? Probably not.”

This is a somewhat shocking conclusion just a couple weeks out from Election Day because Masters has lapped the field in spending, especially on television. With Republican voters tuned into coverage of the RNC, this could be a make or break week for all the campaigns, including that of frontrunner Abe Hamadeh.

Heywood, who is the former Exec Director of the AZ GOP, cautioned the Arizona Globe to take this in proper context.

“This was a basic survey. I don’t know which of these people voted already, which are gonna vote on Election Day, which have envelope sealed sitting on their desk that they’ll drop off at the polls, and it’ll get counted three days later.” But pressed by the Globe on the universe polled for this survey, Heywood confirmed that it a robust n400 list comprised of Republicans who’ve voted in at least 2 of the last 4 primary elections. That’s a statistically valid sample.

“Again, you look at multiple surveys, during 28 days of voting, and you just try to glean from them how to take them together as kind of a trend. So I mean, the data was real, because I know we pulled a very good Republican file of good numbers.”

Heywood told the Globe he is not working for any candidate in this race.

Some have also been surprised that Trent Franks, the former Congressman who resigned amid some pretty odd scandals, is polling so well.

“The thing people don’t remember,” said Heywood, “is that not only does Franks have name recognition, but out on the trail, grassroots people love him because he quotes the Bible, the Constitution, and he knows his way around Congress. You know, so just when I talk to folks on the ground, even if Franks isn’t their first choice, they say nice things about him.”