We are in the Awareness Era of Public Opinion. Technology has led to lots of polling which media outlets have woven into political narratives, and social media has created a world where the result is amplified selection bias that has been the primary culprit of the “bad polls” over the past ten years.
David Burrell (CEO at Wick Insights)
How is it even possible for Big Media to persist with the Harris Leads Trump myth, except that RFK, Jr, is right about it being “an organ of the Democrat Party” now? When Gallup – the granddaddy of all polls – said Tuesday that of the 10 key issues it tracks to decide which party is up or down, the GOP leads in nine, and Fox News reported Saturday that vote-by-mail data from three key states (FL, NC, PA) shows the edge Democrats enjoyed in 2020 has now evaporated, I smell a hoax.
Polls from CNN (7.2% error) and the LA Times (6.9% error) have trailed only Quinnipiac (8.6%) as the least accurate since 2016, which begs the question: why do legacy media routinely characterize polls from Trafalgar (2.3% error) and Rasmussen (3.2% error) – two of the three most accurate – as having conservative bias? Still, Big Media continues to track elections with polls proven to be the “least accurate” year after year.
David Burrell of Wick Insights (2.3% error) blames “amplified selection bias” for rotten polling and reporting. Which is to say old-school liberals have been replaced by new-school leftists in the press – and the newbies form their low opinion of Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis in left-liberal echo chambers on social media (note how often GOP senators ask Biden’s nominees about now-deleted social-media posts).
Republicans are convinced Big Media wants to depress GOP turn-out by sowing pessimism in persuadable voters, which is why Tom Cotton goes on Sunday talk shows to challenge (liberal) hosts. Why push Russiagate but to demoralize Independents in 2016, or censor the Hunter Biden laptop story but to keep Independents in the dark in 2020? Morale is so important that Trump has taken to saying “I’m actually ahead in the polls” at his rallies. He has to do it.
The “Harris bias” is real – and illustrated in the table below, which shows her current standing in the three most accurate (best) polls, three most inaccurate (worst) polls, and the RCP average of all polls:
| RACE | 3 BEST POLLS AVERAGE | 3 WORST POLLS AVERAGE | RCP POLL AVERAGE |
| National | -2.0 | +1.5 | +2.1 |
| Arizona | -1.3 | -6.5 | -2.2 |
| Georgia | -1.6 | +0.3 | -2.1 |
| Michigan | -0.5 | +5.0 | +1.8 |
| Nevada | -0.6 | +1.0 | +0.4 |
| North Carolina | -1.5 | -0.5 | -0.5 |
| Pennsylvania | -1.0 | +1.3 | +0.6 |
| Wisconsin | +0.3 | +2.0 | +1.0 |
Harris trails nationally and in 6 swing states in the “best” polls (Trafalgar, Insider Advantage, Rasmussen). She’s ahead nationally and in five swing states in the “worst” polls (Quinnipiac, CNN, LA Times). She’s ahead nationally and in four swing states in the Real Clear Politics Average (where erroneous polls predominate). That 3-point variance between the “best” and “worst” polls is slightly worse than 2016 (2.7% error) and 2020 (2.6% error), which is why Democrat James Carville says if she’s up by two, we behind by one.
No question, the Harris campaign knows it’s under-performing Biden’s 2020 campaign, which is why she now wants another debate (and Trump is being coy). Harris’s woes run deeper than trailing Trump nationally by 2-points in the average of historically accurate polls, so how bad is it?
The first red flag is Big Media support is down from Biden 2020. Elon Musk (Twitter X) supports Trump, and Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook) is sitting this one out. Kamala’s MSNBC interviewer (Stephanie Ruhle) concluded afterward that “she’s a politician but I don’t know if she can handle the Oval Office” (name a more pro-Democrat network). The New York Times criticized Kamala’s non-answers, parroting what hundreds of local newspapers have been opining all along: evasive filibusters insult a journalist’s intelligence.
The second red flag are polling cross tabs that show Harris lagging Biden’s 2020 votes from minorities, women, and young voters. Big Media loudly reports how Harris enthuses these voting blocs, while quietly reporting that she lags Biden 2020 with women by 2 points, young voters by 9 points, black voters by 12 points, and Hispanics by 20 points (source: The Hill). The math is simple: Biden beat Harris for the nomination and eked out an electoral-college win in 2020 – and Harris is behind Biden with those key voting blocs.
A third red flag is Gallup’s finding that “the political environment suggests the election is Trump’s to lose” because voters agree with him and his party on nine of ten key issues. This is true, and the Trump campaign is hammering that “issues advantage” in TV ads in seven swing states. Veteran politico Ron Faucheux explains:
“The messaging in those ads is much more disciplined and cogent than that which comes from media coverage of his speeches, interviews, and tweets. In short, Trump’s campaign is doing better framing the choice for voters in the seven swing states than in the ignored 43 states, which include California and Louisiana.”
So how is Harris doing? Well, she’s doing better than her senile boss, and leading Trump in historically inaccurate polls. But she can’t or won’t define her policies and positions to friendly journalists, lags Biden 2020 with key voting blocs, and voters think Republicans are better on 9 out of the 10 election issues that matter. That spells T-R-O-U-B-L-E, which is why Big Media is blaring Harris To Win In A Landslide!