Jay Weber Show transcript 7/28/20 6:10am
I’m now convinced the presidential polls are useless. Let me talk you off the ledge. Most outlets are polling 10-15 percent more Democrats than Republicans.
I came back from a short vacation to a number of emails from listeners claiming: Trump can’t win.
Look at this historical trend or this polling mile-marker: no candidate has ever won when they were behind by such-and-such a margin...100 days out...etc.
I say...nuts to all of it.
Because you have to believe the pollsters are polling accurately- and that is difficult to believe in this atmosphere of political hate...
And when I see NBC and the other networks oversampling democrats by ten percentage points and then claiming Biden is up by 12....
And some of these polls are totally automated. Others are of quote registered voters...who are pretty much anyone who picks up the phone who has ever voted-even once in their life.
Others are of ‘people of voting age’...which is- literally-anyone who picks up the phone.
And then there’s the question of how many respondents are being honest with pollsters...or how many trump supporters hang up on them before they find a republican willing to do the survey.
I don’t take any of it too seriously.
And then there are the few polls that show an entirely different picture. Completely.
Such as Rasmussen. They have a daily tracking poll that only samples-likely- voters. Those who are likely going to show up to vote-and as of Friday...
And no, I don’t think that is true. I don’t think Black Americans are roughly split in half on trump’s approval rating.
So-what do you believe?
The trump team has made moves to replace key staffers-including the campaign manager. And so there’s some anecdotal evidence that the trump campaign-does believe-he is behind.
They do much more careful internal polling...and trump continues to suggest that they aren’t showing Biden winning...
But...we have no idea what trump’s internals really suggest.
The Daily Mail has a story that quotes trump’s new campaign manager....Bill Stepien
And we have talked about those states before-when trump seemed to be riding high and cruising to reelection. These were states that he barely lost in 2016 because he had put no time or effort into them that year. But this time around...he and his team felt they had enough time and money to focus on.
And trump-could-tip main, New Hampshire, and Minnesota if there is a silent thread of trump support that isn’t being measured here.
But-this is a very different assessment from Trump’s new campaign guy.
That is step-in....reminding reporters of the very thing that I have routinely reminded my audience members about: Donald Trump did not win a close race in 2016. He had 304 electoral votes. He only needed 271 when means -this time around- Donald Trump could lose some combination of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania...and still win re-election if he wins all of the other states he won in 2016.
Trump-does not- need to win Wisconsin again in order to get a second term...if he can hold Pennsylvania.
He doesn’t even need to win Michigan again-if he can hold Pennsylvania.
And none of the glitterati media or pundits ever acknowledge this.
And in 2016- Trump and Reince Priebus had no staffers to speak of...in Minnesota, Maine, or New Hampshire. Those were conceded to Hillary and Trump almost won those states, too.
This time around- the trump campaign has full time staffers in all of those states and has had them working for some time now.
Trump only lost Maine by 22-thousand votes last time and Minnesota by about 44-thousand.With absolutely no campaign presence in those states in 2016.
Now-with his track record as a proven republican and conservative?
Now with his track record as a more proven commodity?Can Trump win those votes?
That is the question.
The accomplice media and the dc glitterati would say-no. he cannot. The American people hate trump and realize their 2016 mistake and want him out of office.
That is the narrative that they are deeply invested in and it looks to me like the network polls are rigging their results to feed that narrative and to discourage trump voters.
I mean-
Come on- we are going to poll ten percent more democrats than republicans?
These polls have always had to be weighted to account for the fact that more Americans call themselves democrats than republicans...
But....come on. It’s not that wide a gap.
At least include more independents in the poll. It does appear that more Americans have shifted away from a hard-party affiliation...so....reweight it for that...and poll more independents.
But- to ask ten percent more democrats than republicans ‘who will you vote for’...and then claim Biden is up by 8 or 10 or 12 points is asinine.
And so you have to look at the results skeptically-and analyses the responses thru that prism.
For example: no matter how heavily these polls are weighted in favor of democrats....a few things stand out.
One- that Trump voters are more excited to vote than Biden voters.Every poll shows this.And if turnout is the key-Trump has a better chance at a second term than any of these raw numbers suggest.
Second thing that stands out: Trump always has more support from his own party members than Joe.It, too, is constant.Trump has 80 to 90 percent GOP support...depending on the poll. Biden has like 75 to 80 percent support. Never up there with Trump.
The third thing that is a constant in every poll- Joe Biden is running soft...with Black and Latino voters. This is consistent...poll to poll.he is not getting the 90 percent black support he needs...nor the 65 percent Latino support that he needs...in order to win.He simply isn’t.So forget the main match up number.Turnout for Biden maybe-shockingly-soft come fall.
And the fourth response that stands out in all of these polls- at least-when the question is asked:when the question is asked ‘who do you think will win’....
Or...who are your friends voting for....trump always wins by 53, 55 percent or better.
That question-for pollsters-is sort of an accuracy check. a ballast meant to determine what people -really believe- is going to happen.
It’s like asking....will you root for the bucks to win.Yes, I love the Bucks’
But do you think the bucks will win? Oh. No. no. they won’t win.
For some reason- on the ‘expectation question’ - most Americans- time and again-say they expect trump to win a second term.
Why?Are they secret trump voters?
Probably not...but...they don’t seem to have much confidence in their own candidate.
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