“They not only changed their formula, to put Hillary ahead [over Donald Trump]. They went back and changed the results,” said late Democratic pollster and strategist Pat Caddell in 2016. “They didn’t tweak their procedure — they cooked it.” Caddell wasn’t talking about some obscure news organization, either, when making his comments. He was speaking of Reuters, the world’s second-largest media company.
Caddell would go on to say that he’d never in his life seen a journalistic organization “do something so dishonest.” And considering that Reuters has also been ranked the “second most trusted news brand” raises a question.
What would Caddell say about today’s polls showing Kamala Harris leading Trump in the 2024 presidential race? Should we trust them? Note here that not long ago, Harris was one of American history’s most unpopular vice presidents.
One man who knows where he stands is commentator John Kudla. “Stop Worrying About the Polls,” he states in a Sunday headline: “Kamala’s Lead Is Fake.”
Currently, Harris is “up” 1.8 points in the RealClear Politics (RCP) polling average and by 3.2 according to FiveThirtyEight (FTE). Kudla states that Harris can win, too — but only if the public buys into the mainstream-media propaganda painting Trump as the problem and her as a fresh-faced solution. (Of course, people falling victim to propaganda wouldn’t exactly be unprecedented. They don’t call the electorate’s low-info segment the “idiot vote” for nothing.)
Smoke and Mirrors
Kudla first points out that Trump still has a “secret weapon”: a large number of “un-pollable” Trump supporters. They are such partially because, as with any politically incorrect position, many Americans are reluctant to admit supporting Trump. These are hidden but very real voters.
As for the actual polling results, let’s first consider the 1.8-point RCP lead. Note here that only three of the 11 polls used targeted likely voters (LV). The other eight questioned “registered voters” (RV). Historically, LV surveys are more accurate, too. Moreover, some of these polls were conducted before or overlap with the day (8/23) Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. endorsed Trump. RCP’s average thus cannot perfectly reflect that endorsement’s effect.
Regarding FTE’s 3.2-point Harris lead, Kudla finds it downright befuddling. First, many of the polling organizations it cites are obscure. Examples are “Big Village, Kaplan Strategies, Angus Reid Global, etc,” Kudla writes. “There is also a mishmash of polls of all adults, registered voters, and likely voters, and many still have RFK Jr. as a separate candidate.”
Also, how unbiased are these polls? It’s easy, after all, to by design inflate Harris’s support. Merely “sample more Democrats, more women, more minorities, or do more sampling in metropolitan areas,” points out Kudla. And, in fact, the over-sampling of Democrats is common.
Not Just Incompetence
Kudla then provides some examples of book-cooking:
According to a story in RedState, it is alleged that a recent New York Times/Siena poll was biased. Supposedly, the poll showed significant leads for Kamala in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania that were dubious at best….
Another potential problem with accuracy is that most polling organizations are left-of-center on ideological grounds. Is it possible that they are deliberately inflating Kamala’s support to help her? According to pollster John McLaughlin, this seems to be happening.
“So what they’re doing is they’re polling fewer Republicans. They’re polling a disproportionate number of Biden 2020 voters…. It’s ridiculous. So what they’re doing is they’re trying to pump Harris up. They’re trying to suppress our vote. And this is, you know, there’s smart people doing this, so I think it’s intentional.”
This is no fanciful conclusion. Remember that most pollsters are into polling for the same reason a musician is into music: passion. These are political animals. As Kudla noted, too, they’re generally left-wing.
History Is Repeating Itself
This is nothing new, either. Just consider Democrat Caddell, whom I mentioned at this piece’s opening, and his incredulity at Reuters’ polling shenanigans. “They made a switch, as much as nine points, in their results,” Breitbart quoted him as saying in 2016. “‘This is what the media is willing to do, to try to elect her [Clinton],’ Caddell said,” the site continued. “‘This poll is nothing but a part of a media offensive.’”
The offensive continues, too — and some efforts are polling versions of jumping the shark. For example, Kudla cites a Michigan Bloomberg/Morning Consult five-way poll from 7/28 showing Harris enjoying a 12-point lead. He also highlights the aforementioned New York Times survey showing Harris up by five. Removing “both polls from the average,” Kudla asserts, shrinks Harris’s lead “from 2.3 points to only 0.4, essentially a tie.” (Note: He doesn’t specify which average he’s referencing).
Talking to the Wrong People?
Another relevant factor is that there are three to four percent more Democrats than Republicans in America. This is only, however, because of the very liberal, high-population states of New York and California. This is significant because polling is a measure of the popular vote, whereas presidential elections are determined by electoral votes. Excluding California and New York from the equation also makes the Trump-Harris race a tie.
Finally, Kudla makes one more point, writing:
The real killer for the Kamala poll surge may be response bias. According to Mark Harris, with political consulting firm Coldspark, educated Democrats are 3 to 4 times more likely to answer a poll than non-college Democrats. Also, they are way over-polling the high-turnout voters. Trump tends to have more support from working-class Democrats and low-turnout voters. Harris also claims they see a “historic response bias on surveys that is setting the table for a large polling miss this fall.”
National voter surveys overestimated Democrat support by 1.3% in 2016 and a whopping 3.9% in 2020.
In a nutshell, the polling business isn’t about Truth but marketing — the drug called leftism in Democratic packaging.
Shielded From Folly, They Became Fools
Part of the problem, too, is lack of accountability. Consider: After Reuters’ 2016 trespass, shouldn’t the entity have been shunned? Shouldn’t RCL, FTE, and others have said, “Given your manipulation, we won’t be citing you again until further notice”? This is, first, the right thing to do and would likely yield better polling average results. Just as importantly, however, it also would serve as a disincentive against dishonest behavior. Instead, the message sent is that deceit pays.
Speaking of which brings us to yet one more possible, and quite malevolent, reason for polling propaganda. “The Democrat candidate needs a credible victory story when the Democrats cheat to get it across the finish line,” the top commenter under Kudla’s article averred. “The polls are all about the cheat.”
In truth, current polls’ “flaws” may actually serve to reflect what election results will be inclusive of vote fraud. And for those who’d say this is MAGA, tin-foil-hat paranoia, know that Democrats disagree. As Democratic ex-Hamtramck mayor Karen Majewski put it after her 2021 election loss, she’s “absolutely positive” her office was stolen.
Oh, and by the way, it was allegedly stolen by other Democrats.
