Responding to Colorado Media Matters, Fox 31 says it's “working to address” the “issue of having a default option” in its online polls

On October 16, Colorado Media Matters pointed out that KDVR Fox 31's website, MyFoxColorado, featured an interactive poll about the Colorado gubernatorial race that listed Republican candidate Bob Beauprez as its default option.

On October 17, Fox 31 senior web producer Marc Sternfield issued a statement to Colorado Media Matters in which he said that "[t]he issue of having a default option on our poll is one that, as a new website, we are working to address." Noting that the unscientific poll has since been removed from Fox 31's home page, Sternfield wrote that “many people were not choosing the default option” and that Democratic candidate “Bill Ritter was leading Bob Beauprez by a significant margin.”

Sternfield's October 17 statement:

The issue of having a default option on our poll is one that, as a new website, we are working to address. We have removed the Governor's Race poll from our homepage. The results, however, indicated that many people were not choosing the default option. Bill Ritter was leading Bob Beauprez by a significant margin.