Iran Deal Not Popular With American Jews - POLLING MEMO

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OLIVETREESTRATEGIES.COM \\ WASHINGTON, DC

TO: Interested Parties FR: Nathan Klein, Lead Pollster Olive Tree Strategies DT: August 2, 2015 RE: Iran Deal Not Popular with American Jews

Which poll to trust? That always seems to be the question I am asked. As with all things the answer involves shades of gray. But, the bottom line is that any honest evaluation of the data shows a Jewish community divided over the Iran deal, and the word support does not belong. To be clear, I am a pollster. I have done opinion research at every level of U.S. political campaigns, have worked on over 1,000 projects, and have completed projects on five continents (Im still missing South America and Antarctica penguin poll anyone? to complete the set). Polling is my business, my livelihood, my passion, and my talent. Recently, Fortune Magazine named me the Pollster on the Campaign Dream Team of up-and-coming talents you want to know. To the matter at hand, there have been three polls recently released on the issue of the Iran deal among the American Jewish community, mine (sponsored by The Israel Project), as well as one from the LA Jewish Journal and one from J Street. In our poll, we found

Within the American Jewish community, 47% disapprove of the deal and 44% approve. When looking to Congress for action, 45% call for rejecting the deal and 40% for approving. A majority (52%) disapproves of President Obamas handling of the nuclear negotiations

with Iran, his worst rating across nine different topic areas. The full results from the survey can be found on The Israel Projects website.

Recently, my polling has been on the receiving end of criticisms laughable in their attempts to discredit work showing opposition to the Iran deal. First, lets make one thing clear, the J Street poll is dishonest. It uses biased question language that pre-supposes the deal is successful (a point of contention among foreign policy experts), and the pollster for J Street openly admits the bias in his question. The supposed excuse being that he wanted to compare his findings to other publicly available data, but he could have easily used the language from the neutral and widely respected Pew Research Center if that was the goal. The J Street poll also does not allow respondents to opt-out of the question or provide a dont know / no opinion response. Uriel Heilman of the JTA points out, while the deals opponents tend to be adamant in their opposition, many Jewish proponents are openly ambivalent. If you accept this hypothesis, it means that forcing an answer will inherently bias the results towards supporters, as the opponents are more likely to speak up un-prodded. Nobody should be surprised that this poll is biased, J Street spent hundreds of thousands of dollars advertising in support of the deal long before it was finalized or the details were known (spending announced on 6/23/15, three weeks before the final deal was signed). However, this still leaves us with two polls that have seemingly contradictory results (from The Israel Project and the LA Jewish Journal, which found 48% support the deal, while 28% oppose). How do we put these in context to understand what is happening? First, we look at the differences:

1. Collection Method: I used an online methodology while LA Jewish Journal used a telephone poll. I firmly believe that for an issue poll, online is just as strong, so long as you have

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enough respondents (and we had double the respondents at 1,034 compared to 501 for LAJJ). I have used online polling extensively for the past two political cycles. If anything, online polling leans a little more liberal and young, two traits that would bolster supporters of the deal if it had any impact at all.

2. Selecting Respondents: Both polls ask for religion, and have over a dozen possible answers. The difference is that we only kept self-identified Jews in our sample, LAJJ asked a follow-up of all non-Jews if they identify as Jewish for any reason. This leads to a broader sample, I believe to the detriment of the data (since I dont consider someone who has a Jewish grandparent but does not self-identify with the religion to be a part of the community for the purpose of measuring opinion). Clearly the researchers at LAJJ disagree or they would not have asked the question. Both methods are valid and have their supporters and detractors, but the point is that it can differentiate the results.

3. Question Order: To be as non-biased as possible in our questionnaire design before measuring the Iran deal, we ask about Climate Change and Trade Promotion Authority as lead-ups to the Iran section. This gives us both data for comparison (47% had heard a lot/some about TPA in the Jewish community, 84% about Iran Deal, gives an interesting sense of scale), and prevents us from injecting any external framework into the Iran debate. In the LAJJ poll, the two questions asked immediately before the Iran question were images (favorable/unfavorable) of President Barack Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. This creates a framework for evaluating the deal that pits these leaders (both relatively popular) against one another in a community where 69% voted for President Obama in 2012.

4. Political Demographics: The only political demographic question that the LAJJ asked was ideology. They found 53% identify as liberal, 28% moderate, and 16% conservative, a +37 Lib-Mod difference score. My survey found 45% liberal, 29% moderate, 22% conservative, a +23 Lib-Mod difference. Thats a pretty big difference between the two surveys. In my survey we asked our respondents for whom they voted in 2012, we then weighted the data (only among those who voted, some were not able to or are not registered to vote) so that the population reflected this known political variable. According to the national exit polls in 2012, 69% of Jewish voters supported Obama and 30% Romney. In our poll, it is 69% Obama among those who voted, which is 62% of the overall sample (notably the same as the J Street poll, which was politically balanced despite the poor question language). As near as I can tell there is no political balancing of the data from LAJJ. This may explain the difference in the one comparable statistic (ideology), and not measuring political attitudes/history makes the entire data set suspicious to me. The Iran deal is an inherently political issue, but we have no idea who these respondents are or if their political leanings in any way line up with the American Jewish community.

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5. Question Wording: There are differences, subtle but critical. I clearly believe my wording is more honest, the researchers for LAJJ clearly believe the same about their poll. Neither of us would have put our survey in the field if we believed differently. So, taking a closer look

The Israel Project: Recently, the United States and five other countries (known as the P5+1) reached an agreement with Iran regarding the lifting of economic sanctions on Iran in exchange for concessions in Irans nuclear program. Based on what you know, do you approve or disapprove of this agreement? (Respondents were also given a Dont Know / No Opinion response option, though that language does not appear in the question itself.) LAJJ: As you may know, an agreement was reached in which the United States and other countries would lift major economic sanctions against Iran, in exchange for Iran restricting its nuclear program in a way that makes it harder for it to produce nuclear weapons. Do you support or oppose this agreement, or dont know enough to say?

Some critics of my question say that using the word concessions creates bias against the deal. And yet, the deal reduces rather than eliminates Irans centrifuges. The deal eliminates the nuclear capacity at Arak, but not at Fordow. These are nothing if not negotiated concessions, rather than outright capitulation. I would be happy to test the deal with different language when we get a different deal. The question from LAJJ posits that the deal makes it harder for [Iran] to produce nuclear weapons. The problem is that this is the exact issue up for debate by foreign policy experts. Some do not believe this deal makes it harder, many experts believe that this deal makes it much easier for Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon in the long term (and in geo-politics, 10-15 years is not that long). They point to concerns such as the expiration date on the deal, the huge financial windfall for Iran, and continued nuclear research as reasons that this deal may put Iran on the glide path to nuclear breakout. The question from LAJJ presents an assumption that the deal will be successful in achieving this goal, rather than presenting the terms of the deal itself for respondents to either support or oppose. This bias, this assumption that the deal will work, precludes many possible outcomes, and this data cannot be considered unbiased.

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At the end of the day, the number one reason you should trust my data because if I had wanted to juice the numbers for opponents of the deal, I could have easily asked this question:

Recently, the United States entered into a deal with Iran that will give Irans leaders $100-$150billion, allow Iran to purchase advanced weaponry and ballistic missiles, and will allow Iran to continue nuclear research and enrichment on a small scale. In exchange, Iran will reduce its number of centrifuges, and maintain only some of their current nuclear facilities. Iran has also promised that it will not seek a nuclear weapon. Iranian leaders say that what matters is Western acceptance that Iran will continue to have a nuclear program, and that when the agreement ends in 2025 Iran will be able to enrich uranium and plutonium without limits. Based on what you know, do you approve or disapprove of this agreement?

Bottom Line: As a dual citizen of the United States and Israel, I would have (and hopefully will someday) support a deal that prevents Iran from getting a nuclear weapon. But, as a pollster, I am obligated to measure American Jewish opinion of what this deal is today, not what some hope it can achieve. Today, the Jewish community is split, with a slim plurality opposing the deal. But, as the rest of our survey shows, the more that the community learns about this deal the more opposition rises. -- Nathan Klein is the founder of Olive Tree Strategies. He has been working in political polling since 2008, including as the Director of Polling and Analytics for the National Republican Senatorial Committee during the 2014 elections, and as the Deputy Polling Manager on the 2012 Romney presidential campaign. He has been conducting research on American opinions of the Middle East since 2008.

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Iran Deal Not Popular With American Jews - POLLING MEMO