Minutes before Ann Romney’s RNC speech, ABC Radio announced an ABC News/Washington Post poll purportedly showing a majority of Americans have an unfavorable view of Mitt Romney.
Anchor Aaron Katersky tried to overshadow the content of Mrs. Romney’s speech by framing it around the breaking poll’s results. Mrs. Romney’s task was to overcome the unfavorable views the majority of Americans have of Mitt Romney, Katersky claimed. He repeated this theme three separate times in the minutes preceding Mrs. Romney’s speech.
Since the poll results were revealed on radio, viewers were unable analyze its methodology. Many recent national polls have dramatically oversampled Democrats, and this has skewed their results.
Politico reported the poll’s release in a story headlined: “ABC News blasts negative Romney poll during Ann Romney speech”:
The timing of the release was concurrent with Ann Romney’s speech at the Republican National Convention, a move that ensured reporters would see the poll, but — like the bevy of opposition emails reporters are receiving from the Obama campaign tonight — also seemed to compete for Ann Romney’s moment on the national stage.
In the same broadcast, anchor Sam Donaldson proclaimed it would be a “black mark against the Romney campaign” if Mitt Romney didn’t come out after Mrs. Romney’s speech to congratulate her. Mr. Donaldson’s concern was for naught; as Ann Romney completed her talk, Governor Romney bounded up to her.
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