Poll: GOP voters want Brewer to veto SB1062

Jim Small//February 25, 2014

apple-620 A poll commissioned yesterday by a Phoenix political consulting firm finds that more than twice as many Republican voters in Arizona want Gov. Jan Brewer to veto SB1062 than want her to sign it.

In the automated poll of 802 Republicans by Coleman Dahm, a Republican political consulting firm in Phoenix, 57.1 percent of respondents who were asked about the bill said they would like Brewer to veto it. Only 27.6 percent said they want her to sign SB1062. The remaining 15.3 percent had no opinion. The poll has a margin of error of +/- 4 percentage points.

The controversial bill, which many say will allow businesses to use their religious beliefs as a reason to discriminate against homosexuals, has put Arizona in the national spotlight over the past week.

Bert Coleman, one of the firm’s partners, said that the poll was of “hard core” Republican voters who had voted both of the last two primary elections. He said the results show that even conservative Republicans believe the bill is bad for the state’s image and will harm its economy.

“Clearly, the electorate thinks that there are other priorities in Arizona. Anything that would hamper the economic recovery such as discriminatory extremist legislation will not be tolerated by the majority of Republican voters in the state,” he said. “As in the rest of the country, Arizona GOP voters do not believe that the perception that any discrimination is all right, let alone a bill clearly designed to put segments of society at a disadvantage when it comes to fair and equal treatment.”