Immediately following tonight’s town-hall-style presidential debate between Republican Mitt Romney and Democrat Barack Obama, SurveyUSA interviewed 800 California adults, of whom 656 watched the debate. Results of tonight’s 10/16/12 debate follow (with results of the 10/03/12 Denver presidential debate in parenthesis).

* 56% say Obama was the clear winner tonight (compared to 34% who say Obama won the 1st debate in Denver ).
* 32% say Romney was the clear winner tonight (compared to 48% who say Romney won the 1st debate in Denver).
* 12% say there was no clear winner tonight.

As always, the caution that California is a “blue” state and more Democrats in California watch a debate than do Republicans. That’s why it’s important to study reaction along party lines:

* Democrats by 72 points say Obama was tonight’s clear winner (Democrats gave Obama a 30-point margin in Denver).
* Republicans by 41 points say Romney was tonight’s clear winner (Republicans gave Romney a 65-point margin in Denver).
* Independents split, 44% for Romney, 44% for Obama (Independents favored Romney by 34 points in Denver).
* Every region of the state scored the debate for Obama.

SurveyUSA’s California research conducted exclusively for KABC-TV Los Angeles, KPIX-TV San Francisco, KFSN-TV Fresno, and KGTV-TV San Diego.