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Just a couple of weeks ago, it looked like the backers of California’s Proposition 37, the GMO-food labeling initiative, were in a solid position to score a victory. Numbers from a LA Times/USC poll showed the California Right to Know campaign with a comfortable two-to-one margin over the No on 37 campaigners, who are mostly backed by Big Food interests such as Monsanto, DuPont, the Grocery Manufacturers Association, and Coca-Cola.

What a difference a $34 million campaign chest can make. The latest public opinion survey shows public support for the GMO labeling initiative is crumbling. A poll released last week by the Pepperdine University School of Public Policy and the California Business Roundtable shows that less than half  (48.3 percent) of California voters are in favor of the measure. Forty percent of poll respondents are opposed, while 11.5 percent of voters are undecided.

According to California Right to Know spokeswoman Stacy Malkan, a loss of public support is to be expected when massive television, radio, and mail advertising gobsmacks the electorate.  “We attribute [the new poll numbers] to the pounding, incessant lies the No on 37 campaign has been hammering voters with all day, every day.”