Pollster · Commercial firm

EPIC-MRA

Research draft
Polls since 2024
7
Latest poll ended
August 28, 2026
Record vs. results, relative
D+0.2

Polls from the VoteHub polling API, used under CC BY 4.0. Each result links to the pollster's or sponsor's own release. Imported once a day; a poll VoteHub later changes keeps its earlier version on record here.

§1About

Drafted by AI from the public sources cited. Each sentence links to its source.

EPIC-MRA describes itself as a survey research firm in Lansing, Michigan, that has done business in Michigan since 1985, offering public opinion and market research, focus groups and campaign services.1,2 Its team page names Bernie Porn as a founding partner and president, Kelly Sullivan as partner, vice president and chief executive officer, and Neal Richey as a partner since 1985.3 Its company page says the firm manages all phases of its survey work itself, including interviewing and data processing.2

Kind
Commercial firm2
Founded
19852,3

§2Who it works with

Why this matters: Owners, news partners and the firms behind a poll's interviews shape what gets asked, how, and what gets published.

News partners

  • Detroit Free Press. Its company and client pages list the Detroit Free Press among its media clients without giving dates.2,4
  • WJRT (ABC12). Its company page lists WJRT TV12 among its Michigan media clients, and ABC12 reported in November 2025 that EPIC-MRA conducted an exclusive statewide poll for the station.2,5
  • WXYZ-TV. Its company and client pages list WXYZ TV7 in Detroit among its media clients without giving dates.2,4
  • WOOD-TV. Its company and client pages list WOOD TV8 in Grand Rapids among its media clients without giving dates.2,4
  • WLNS-TV. Its company and client pages list WLNS TV6 in Lansing among its media clients without giving dates.2,4
  • MIRS. Its client page lists MIRS News Service among its media clients, and its press room lists a September 2022 EPIC-MRA MIRS statewide survey.4,6

Founded by

  • Bernie Porn. Its team page calls Bernie Porn a founding partner of the firm.3

Led by

  • Bernie Porn. Its team page lists Bernie Porn as president.3
  • Kelly Sullivan. Its team page lists Kelly Sullivan as partner, vice president and chief executive officer.3

Who paid for its polls

Sponsors named on its polls, most polls first7. A party-aligned flag is VoteHub's, per poll.
SponsorPollsBetweenFlagged party-aligned
MIRS3July 31, 2026No
ABC 122November 11, 2025No

§3Whom it works for

Why this matters: A firm that also works for one party's campaigns can still publish accurate polls, but readers deserve to know.

Doesn’t say whom it works for. Its elections page offers survey research and campaign advice to candidate and ballot committees, and its client page lists labor unions, business groups, advocacy groups and governments, but none of the pages read names a party committee or a candidate of either party. This rests on its own pages.4,8

Of its 7 polls listed since the 2024 election, VoteHub flags 0 as paid for by a Democratic-aligned sponsor and 0 by a Republican-aligned sponsor7.

§4Record against results

Why this matters: The one test that doesn't depend on other polls: how close a firm's final polls came to what voters did.

From FiveThirtyEight's final public data9,10: general-election polls between a Democrat and a Republican in the last three weeks before each election, compared with the certified result. FiveThirtyEight rated each name polls were published under separately. Across all 8,957 such polls, the average miss was D+0.7, so the relative figure takes out the misses every pollster shared that year.

Error is the poll's D−R margin minus the result's; D+ means it showed Democrats doing better than they did.
Published asPollsElectionsAverage missRelative to other pollsTypical size of miss538's last rating
EPIC-MRA482000–2022D+0.2D+0.24.7 pts1.9 of 3

ABC News closed FiveThirtyEight in March 2025; its data stops at the 2022 elections. 2026 results will be added once states certify them.

§5Its polls

The 7 polls of its we list, newest first.
In the fieldQuestionResultWithPaid for bySample
August 22–August 28, 2026U.S. Senate · 2026 MichiganAbdul El-Sayed 47 · Mike Rogers 43600 LV
August 22–August 28, 2026Governor · 2026 MichiganJocelyn Benson 45 · John James 41600 LV
July 24–July 31, 2026U.S. Senate · 2026 MichiganHaley Stevens 44 · Mike Rogers 42MIRS600 LV
July 24–July 31, 2026Governor · 2026 MichiganJocelyn Benson 47 · John James 38MIRS600 LV
July 24–July 31, 2026U.S. Senate · 2026 MichiganMike Rogers 46 · Abdul El-Sayed 43MIRS600 LV
November 6–November 11, 2025U.S. Senate · 2026 MichiganHaley Stevens 44 · Mike Rogers 42ABC 12600 LV
November 6–November 11, 2025U.S. Senate · 2026 MichiganMallory McMorrow 43 · Mike Rogers 42ABC 12600 LV

§6What we looked for and didn't find

  • The www.epicmra.com address fails a certificate check over HTTPS; its pages were read at the Comcast web-hosting address that the plain HTTP address redirects to.
  • No dates were given for its media client relationships, and no source read said which of them are current.
  • Its elections page names John Cavanagh as a principal, but the team page does not list him, so his current role was not confirmed.
  • No ownership information beyond the named partners was found.
  • Searches found no AAPOR statement, court ruling or filing, regulator action, aggregator statement about excluding or reweighting its polls, or retraction by the firm.