The polls on the Biden-Trump rematch are incomprehensibly bad for Biden. They’re even more incomprehensibly good for Trump. That’s certainly true of the latest national poll from NBC News, which has Trump leading on a host of issues including competence and effectiveness, mental and physical health, the economy, foreign policy and America’s standing in the world, and crime, immigration and the border.
Biden’s approval numbers are at a new low in the NBC poll, which is consistent with other polls. It’s completely unclear why this is the case. The economy is performing spectacularly, especially when you consider where it was when Biden took over from Trump. And, yes, I know that inflation turned the American people on Biden, but they are beginning to recognize that things have turned a corner and yet they give Biden no credit for it.
Some of these results are preposterous, like the idea that Trump has good mental health or would improve America’s standing in the world. But I am not in the business of waving off poll numbers I don’t like or don’t understand. Right now, Trump should be considered a moderately strong favorite to beat Biden. Yet, it’s hard to believe these types of numbers will hold for Trump.
In the new NBC News poll, Biden holds the advantage over Trump among Black voters (75% to 16%), women (50% to 40%) and white people with college degrees (50% to 42%).
Trump, meanwhile, has leads among white people without college degrees (62% to 29%), men (56% to 34%) and independents (48% to 29%).
The two men are essentially tied among Latinos (Trump 42%, Biden 41%) and voters ages 18-34 (at 42% each). Among the youngest slice of voters measured, those ages 18-29, Biden has a narrow advantage (Biden 46%, Trump 38%).
Is Trump really going to win the Latino vote? Will he really tie Biden with voters under 35? Is there a chance he’ll carry 16 percent of the black vote? Can Biden possibly get barely more than a third of men? And will women only give Biden a 10 point edge?
That’s what these groups are saying right now in these surveys, but that would be a mind-blowing collapse of the Democratic coalition, to put it mildly. And all in favor of a person like Trump?
I’m very worried because these numbers are getting confirmed enough that there must be something to it, but I just can’t for the life of me understand why this is happening or what to do about it.
I have two questions:
It seems as if we have been living through a real Bizarro world when it comes to polls in the age of Trump. For the last few years we have seen this continuing theme that Dems are on the brink of disaster, yet it seems they continue to outperform the polling in elections. Yes, it seems these polls are disastrous for Biden, and they are, but what level of confidence can we have on this? Beats the f$%k out of me. That’s really kind of up in the air, I guess. I’m as perplexed as you. Could this be the election cycle where we find that the polling methodology that everyone has become conditioned to rely upon is no longer reliable? Trumpism has destroyed everything else, could it have blown up the tried and true method of election prognostication on which everyone has relied for, well, ever? I don’t have a clue, and all of this can probably only make sense as part of a post-mortem of the November results. Sadly, sometimes hindsight is the only reliable thing we have.
All I can do is work hard inside my own little circle of influence. It is a certainty that it’s going to take a coordinated Herculean effort to get our democracy across the finish line ahead of American fascism. I’m truly nervous. Everyone should plan accordingly.
I hear you Martin. It really is inexplicable. But here is what I’m thinking.
1. These polls are bullshit.
2. There is no way that stupid fucking traitor Trump can win.
3. He lost by 7 million votes in 2020. In the last 4 years 8 million new voters are eligible & at least 5 million senior citizens have passed away. You really think young people are buying Republican bullshit.
5. There is literally no Republican policy that is favorable.
6. We have overperfored every election for the past 3 years
The Independent Centrist Uninvolved Voter (courtesy of Driftglass).
For perspective, here are some headlines from a single day, October 25, 2022 (via memeorandum.com).
CBS News Battleground Tracker poll: Pennsylvania Senate contest narrows (CBS)
If These Poll Results Keep Up, Expect Anything on Election Night (NYT)
The Polls Are Getting Better For Republicans (538)
Democrats growing anxious – again – over Black turnout (Politico)
Fearing a New Shellacking, Democrats Rush for Economic Message (NYT)
Bolduc Gains on Hassan in US Senate Election (Emerson Polling)
Democrats Are Deer in the Headlights on Crime Problem (Politico)
Democrats Need to Know What Time It Is – A lesson and a warning from the Katie Hobbs Experience (The Bulwark)
Kari Lake is Dangerous Enough to Get Elected President (Daily Beast)
Pelosi’s Last Dance? Speaker Sprints Across U.S. as Republicans Close In (NYT)
Pro-Trump Republicans court election volunteers to ‘challenge any vote’ (WaPo)
Democrats are blowing it in a race that has life-or-death implications for democracy: conservative (Raw Story)
Black Republicans are ‘no longer hiding’ as they run for Congress (WaPo)
This is a small sample from one day in the national media; the partisans, like Breitbart and Red State, are even worse. The message is always the same: Democrats are the true minority and are in collapse, Republicans are the true majority, ascendant and inevitable. The purpose is to discourage you into despair and inaction. However, once you see this pattern and compare these headlines with actual election results, it becomes easier to resist their propaganda and move forward with confidence.
The media (including pollsters) are not here to inform you. They are here to tell you a story. You have no obligation to believe them. When they tell you something that seems like nonsense, just remember the nonsense thing they told you two years ago, and treat accordingly.
5
Polls don’t mean shit, the popular vote doesn’t mean shit, the only thing that matters is turnout.
Either “good” turnout happens or it doesn’t.
My personal opinion has already been stated here by others, fascists and their allies are all about making it about how they cannot lose because they have the poll numbers and they shout it out every day. Hence Biden winning again would again be election fraud, and we might as well go ahead and murder Democrats in their sleep to protect America from Satan.
Good comments already in this thread. I’ll just add a bit from a new post over at Digby’s Blog:
1) Polls don’t predict elections. (Otherwise, Mike Dukakis would have won in a landslide back in 1988; he was way ahead of H. W. Bush in all the polls at this time of year.)
2) Even the most reputable/professional polls don’t agree with each other. In 5 recent polls, Biden wins the youth vote by a range 2 to 20 points. Among independent voters, Biden wins by as much as 12…or loses by as much as 19. https://digbysblog.net/2024/02/05/surviving-the-pollercoaster/
So, one answer to “why is this happening?” is “we don’t know that it is (and in fact it’s probably not)”. Josh Marshall has taken to talking about “Team Polls” and “Team Specials” as a shorthand for analysts/commentators who follow polls (which have generally been dismal for Democrats in recent years) and those who follow election returns in special and off-year elections (where Democrats have generally overperformed recently).
Final thought: for decades now Ed Kilgore has made the point that “enthusiasm” for a candidate is of limited value. It only matters when it gets a voter to: 1) switch their vote from one party to the other, or 2) vote as opposed to staying home. Any extra “enthusiasm” that voter has doesn’t matter very much because they can’t vote more than once. (Yes, they can make donations, volunteer on campaigns, etc.; and yes, that matters too…but only so much.)
This is another reason all the attention on Trump’s base is largely a waste of time and energy. *Of course* his base supports him. That’s what a base does. (See: South Carolina primary voters giving 96% of their votes to Biden.) But when it comes to counting votes, all those people who buy Trump’s gear and attend his rallies have the same number of votes we all do: one. And them being more “enthusiastic” (or delusional or fascist) can’t change that.
I am mostly ignoring the mainstream news and just following a few experts such as Martin. And Jennifer Mercieca. And I subscribe to Resolute Square among others. Stuart Stevens ends today’s campaign memo with this, and I’d like to believe it (you might notice a small edit):
By crushing Dean Phillips, the Biden campaign avoided what could have been a landmine for their re-election efforts. There will be zero pressure for Phillips to speak at the convention and Biden rolls into the general election with a unified party. Though polls show him trailing the orange shitgibbon, Biden will win decisively, by a larger margin than in 2020. Killing the Phillips campaign in the crib, as we say in politics, was the first step toward that victory.
5
According to 538 Biden is the least popular incumbent at this point in a presidency of all the presidents they have approval ratings on. Trump is also a very unpopular candidate with an underwater approval rating, and until fall 2023 Biden was beating him in head to head polls (both lost against a genericcandidate from the opposing party). But during the fall and winter Biden’s approval rating has grown steadily worse and now Trump is winning the head to head polling.
Those are just the facts. Now why could this be? Maybe the Biden campaign should ask the campaign staffers that resigned. Or the state department staffers resigned. Or anyone under 40. I think the answer would be aiding and abetting a genocide. People don’t like that.