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TargetPoint Consulting | 66 Canal Center Plaza, Ste 555 | Alexandria, VA 22314 | 703.535.8505 |http://www.targetpointconsulting.com | twitter: @tpctweet | facebook.com/targetpoint

TO: Interested Parties

FROM: Alex Lundry, TargetPoint Consulting

DATE: September 26, 2013

RE: National Poll Results

TargetPoint Consulting conducted a national survey of 800 registered voters September

13-18, 2013 on attitudes towards the upcoming legislative debates over the continuing

resolution and the debt ceiling. The margin of error for the survey is +/- 3.5%. The

survey was conducted on behalf of Ending Spending (www.EndingSpending.com ) and

American Action Forum (www.AmericanActionForum.org).

OVERALL TAKEAWAY

A frustrated electorate is desperate for change. They are disappointed with the

President. They are deeply unhappy with Obamacare, and a majority welcome a delay

of the individual mandate. They are unhappy with federal spending, and a majority arelooking for meaningful tradeoffs in exchange for raising the debt ceiling in other

words, the American people want President Obama to negotiate with Congress in order

to find a path forward on the national debt. Despite all this, they are reluctant to

embrace a government shutdown.

KEY FINDINGS

1. AN OPPORTUNITY: Obama is badly bruised. The President's numbers aren't

strong, with an underwater approval rating (43% approve, 49% disapprove), and a

generic congressional ballot that has Republicans ahead by 4 points (40% GOP, 36%

DEM).

2. READY FOR A DELAY: Obamas health care plan is especially beat up. A majority

oppose the Presidents signature legislation 39% support and 55% oppose.

Opposition is intense with 44% of Americans strongly disapproving of the law.

Moreover, a majority support delay: 55% of registered voters support a one year

delay of the individual mandate. This is with specific references to the delay in the

employer mandate and exemptions various organizations have received for different

parts of the law. Only 35% oppose a one year delay of Obamacare.

3. NO CLEAN DEBT LIMIT: There is intense opposition to raising the debt ceiling. Ahefty majority is opposed to increasing the debt ceiling: on a clean favor/oppose

question on raising the debt ceiling, a stunning 65% - nearly two thirds of registered

voters oppose raising it. Only 27% favor it for net score of37. Reinforcing this

point, nearly half of voters (48%) STRONGLY oppose raising the debt ceiling. Among

Independents the numbers are even stronger: 70% opposed (56% strongly) and 26%

favor.

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4. PRESIDENT SHOULD NEGOTIATE: Despite this opposition, a majority of voters

want to use this opportunity to negotiate over related government policies. 52%

of registered voters would rather see negotiation over the debt ceiling than a

straight up or down vote (which only 38% want).

5. POTENTIAL SOLUTIONS: Popular policy changes in exchange for a debt-limit

increase. Indeed, there are a number of related government policies that a majority

would approve of as a meaningful tradeoff in exchange for raising the debt

ceiling. Here are five items that at least 54% of Americans agree would be good

tradeoffs in exchange for increasing the debt limit:

73% - Ease Americas dependence upon Mideast oil, lower the cost of

gasoline and create jobs for American workers by building the Keystone Oil

Pipeline.

64% - Reform the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program also known

as SNAP or food stamps by eliminating inefficiencies and revisiting eligibility

standards.

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57% - Eliminate certain tax breaks for people and businesses as part of tax

code reform.

55% - Keep Medicare from going broke by means-testing premiums and

benefits.

54% - Delay implementation of Obamacare in order to limit the

consequences of this harmful law.

6. DEFUND ALMOST WORKS, BUT NO SHUTDOWN: We can extract some underlying

truths from the survey data we collected on the continuing resolution

1) There is strong reluctance to let the government pass a business-as-usual bill,

and 2) Obamacare opposition is powerful enough to move numbers when we attach

it to other items, but 3) for a majority of voters actually shutting down the

government is a bridge too far.

We walked respondents through a number of ballots related to the continuingresolution, each building upon another in order to isolate the effect of additional

information. Fewer than half of registered voters support a passing a clean

continuing resolution (48% favor, 40% oppose) this echoes the frustration we

heard in other focus groups where participants expressed exasperation over

government funding and were reluctant to let it keep operating in "business as

usual" mode.

This 8-point advantage grows to a 10-point advantage when we add defunding of

Obamacare to the mix (51% support passing a CR with a defunding of Obamacare,

41% oppose it).

However, things change RADICALLY when we mention the word shutdown:

informing them that this could cause the government to shutdown, opposition

grows to the majority position with 51% opposing a CR that defunds Obamacare,

32% favoring it.