Yesterday and today you might have seen a couple of posts here at The Hayride, one by Joe Cunningham yesterday and another by Cory Dennis earlier this morning, on this survey that Baton Rouge-based pollster John Couvillon put out. It had a number of eyebrow-raising results, among which was that Gov. Jeff Landry’s approval rating supposedly sits at 39 percent.

Cunningham accepted that number and then offered some explanations for it – the two most prominent being that Landry is seen by a lot of people as in bed with the trial lawyers and he’s vetoed a few high-profile tort reform bills, and the other being the situation with redistricting and the fact that people peg Landry as the reason Garret Graves isn’t in Congress and Cleo Fields is.

But Dennis – who is the Executive Director of the LAGOP, in case you don’t know who he is – brought some fire down on Joe, and by extension The Hayride as a whole, for having given credit enough to the poll to cover it in the first place. His position is that this poll is a piece of leftist propaganda, as it was commissioned by a dark money group called Unite America which calls itself nonpartisan but most assuredly is not.

So… what to believe?

Well, there are surveys out there which actually have Landry’s approval number as worse than 39. Is it that bad? Honestly, I don’t think it makes much of a difference two years out from Landry’s re-election campaign what the number is. If it’s 39 now but he manages to get it into the mid-40’s in 18 months or so, he’s still almost certainly going to get re-elected.

What I would suggest is that somebody ought to bring a bill in the special session that starts later today which institutes party primaries in gubernatorial elections in Louisiana, though, because that would not only do Landry some good, but it would better align Louisiana’s governor with the state’s effective majority party.

More on that in another column.

My guess is most people in this state haven’t decided what they think of Jeff Landry. I’m thinking they probably like that he sent the State Police into New Orleans to help bolster law enforcement there. I suspect they’re reasonably happy about more than $70 billion in outside investment dollars that have come into the state since his inauguration. I see some evidence that people are at least slightly relieved with the beginnings of abatement of insurance premiums here and there.

But I don’t think Joe is wrong about those two things being problematic. If you’ve been reading The Hayride lately, you know that I’ve been referring to Cleo Fields as the unflushed toilet of Louisiana politics, and I think Landry has a real problem with his base if Fields and Troy Carter are both still in Congress after next fall’s elections.

But as to Cory’s point? Is this a left-wing propaganda poll?

Unite America is a left-wing propaganda organization. They call themselves centrists, but what they really are is anti-MAGA. Remember Evan McMullin, that CIA shill who ran a third-party campaign to dilute Trump’s vote in 2016? He’s one of the principals in this outfit. Cory is not wrong in his characterization of these guys.

So then there’s the question about the pollster.

Look, I’ve known John Couvillon for a long time. His polls are ubiquitous. And he does work for practically everybody. A lot of what John does is perfectly reputable polling and turns out to be correct.

So I’d be willing to look at this 39 percent number and say it could be legitimate. Even if it isn’t, I’d say that this is a state which regularly votes Republican by 55-60 percent, and so that’s really where Jeff’s approval ought to be and if he’s below that point then he’s got work to do regardless of the number.

Though I would also say that what he’s been doing in the last couple of months, things like the Belle Chasse bridge toll moratorium and locking out the gangsters from the Bottoms on LSU game days with a larger police presence, are going to serve him well for the next time somebody polls his approval.

But maybe the number is bad and Couvillon hit on something.

Except I saw another one of Couvillon’s polls this week, and I’m not sure how much faith I can put into any of this anymore.

Couvillon is polling for John Fleming, and earlier this week the campaign put this out…

Here’s the thing: I actually do believe these numbers. I can 100 percent believe that John Fleming would be ahead of Bill Cassidy in a head-to-head GOP primary race, and I can believe Fleming might have a little edge on Cassidy in a full-on primary.

But this is still an utterly ridiculous poll, and I can’t believe Couvillon would put his name on it. Fifty-two percent for “others” or undecided? Seriously?

John Fleming and Bill Cassidy are not the only candidates and potential candidates in this race. Not by a long shot.

Louisiana state representative Julie Emerson, who chairs the House Ways and Means Committee, has filed papers to enter the race. Public service commissioner Eric Skrmetta has publicly announced he’s running. And state senator Blake Miguez has not only announced his candidacy but he’s raised more than $3 million and has $2.5 million in the bank.

And you don’t name any of them in your poll?

I get it. If I’m Fleming, I want to focus on how I do against Cassidy, because I can show that I beat him straight-up in the runoff.

Except so does everybody else. Couvillon’s poll has Cassidy at 29 percent in a runoff with Fleming. Does anybody think that number goes to 50 against the other candidates?

A real poll would at least include Miguez by name, if not Skrmetta. This one is a propaganda poll.

And what it tells you is that Couvillon, who really is a good pollster when he wants to be, is basically singing for his supper these days. This is a poll which is a classic example of getting whatever numbers you want.

So why would you believe Landry is at 39 percent when it comes from a left-wing source funding the poll that generates those numbers, and you know the pollster will do any old thing that pays his bills?

You can believe it, or not. Up to you. As I said, I don’t think it matters what Landry’s approval numbers are right now and I expect whatever they are will rise as the state recovers from the misrule of John Bel Edwards.

And if Brian Kelly gets packed off to the glue factory before the 2027 election, Landry’s chances of re-election get even better. If you’re a regular reader here you understand my reasoning why.

But if you want to take that 39 percent number with a grain of salt, the fact that the pollster is willing to fail to include Miguez in a poll of the Senate race based on who’s paying him is a pretty good bit of logical ammunition for you.

I’m actually a little appalled by that. And while I can see some value in what both Joe and Cory are saying, from now on I’m going to suggest that we know the funding on all of these polls before we give any credence to them.