Americans were more likely to give negative than positive reviews to Ted Cruz's quasi-filibuster earlier this week, according to a new HuffPost/YouGov poll, which also showed huge support among Republicans for the speech and boosted name recognition for Cruz.
Overall, the poll found that Americans were more likely to call Cruz's speech an unnecessary political stunt than a good way of making an important point, by a 41 percent to 32 percent plurality.
Reviews were better for another recent Republican filibuster. A HuffPost/YouGov poll conducted after Sen. Rand Paul's March filibuster on the United States drones program, showed that 38 percent of Americans thought the filibuster was a good way to make an important point while 30 percent said it was an unnecessary political stunt.
But in the newest poll, Cruz garnered huge support from Republicans, 69 percent of whom said they thought the speech was a good way to make an important point.
Twenty-nine percent of respondents overall said they have a favorable opinion of Cruz, while 31 percent said they have an unfavorable opinion. Forty-one percent said they're not sure of their opinion on Cruz.
The poll shows Cruz's marathon speech achieved at least one thing: name recognition. Only a few days before the speech, a YouGov poll conducted Sept. 20-21 showed 52 percent had no opinion of Cruz. At that time, 24 percent had a favorable opinion of Cruz and 25 percent said they had an unfavorable opinion.
Among Republicans, favorable opinion of Cruz jumped from 46 percent in the earlier poll to 61 percent in the new poll, while those saying they were unable to rate Cruz dropped from 46 percent to 30 percent.
The poll found Americans evenly divided on Cruz's goal of defunding President Barack Obama's health care law as part of any budget agreement. Thirty-nine percent of respondents said they support that goal, while 41 percent said they opposed it. Twenty-one percent weren't sure.
But among respondents who said that they believe the Affordable Care Act should be repealed, 61 percent supported using the budget process to force a repeal, even if it meant shutting down the government. Twenty-eight percent said that lawmakers who support a repeal should continue to fight for that outcome, but not by shutting down the government.
Forty-three percent of respondents said they wanted the health care law repealed entirely, while 25 percent wanted to see it expanded and 13 percent wanted it kept the same. Eighty-four percent of Republicans wanted to see the law repealed.
The HuffPost/YouGov poll was conducted Sept. 25-26 among 1,000 U.S. adults using a sample selected from YouGov's opt-in online panel to match the demographics and other characteristics of the adult U.S. population. Factors considered include age, race, gender, education, employment, income, marital status, number of children, voter registration, time and location of Internet access, interest in politics, religion and church attendance.
The Huffington Post has teamed up with YouGov to conduct daily opinion polls. You can learn more about this project and take part in YouGov's nationally representative opinion polling.
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