For the first time since 538 published our presidential election forecast for Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump, Trump has taken the lead (if a very small one) over Harris. As of 3 p.m. Eastern on Oct. 18, our model gives Trump a 52-in-100 chance of winning the majority of Electoral College votes. The model gives Harris a 48-in-100 chance.
The problem is, their simulations are based on their polling, and their polling is being manipulated.
As I noted elsewhere:
Yes, Trump appears to have momentum, but it also appears to be a phantom momentum driven by right leaning polling organizations.
https://www.hopiumchronicles.com/p/the-hungry-harris-campaign-early?utm_source=publication-search
"I now count 27 Republican or right-aligned entities in the polling averages:
American Greatness, Daily Mail, co/efficent, Cygnal, Echelon, Emerson, Fabrizio, Fox News, Insider Advantage, McLaughlin, Mitchell Communications, Napolitan Institute, Noble Predictive, On Message, Orbital Digital, Public Opinion Strategies, Quantus, Rasmussen, Redfield & Wilton, Remington, RMG, SoCal Data, The Telegraph, Trafalgar, TIPP, Victory Insights, Wall Street Journal.
In September 12 of the 24 polls of North Carolina were conducted by red wave pollsters. Check out the last 4 polls released in PA on 538. All are red wavers."
Yes, but their “house effects” (how much their polls lean Republican or Democrat) are accounted for by every worthwhile polling aggregator.
If they were just taking the averages and spitting out results, well, it’d be nonsensical. You could maybe argue that Republican pollsters have tweaked their systems to be more trumpy but that’d be a pretty huge red flag and mark you as completely non trustworthy in your professional field.
You can read Silver’s more in depth and interesting explanation here:
https://www.natesilver.net/p/are-republican-pollsters-flooding
My reading of Nate Silver’s article suggests that the OC (original commenter’s) comment is right though. Quote from the article:
the movement could just be random variation in the polls — if Harris really is ahead nationally by 3 points and in the Blue Wall states by about 1 point we’d expect her to have better and worse weeks that vary around that average.
Sounds like phantom momentum to me. And Nate also agrees with the part about there being Republican bias in the polls,
First, are polls from Republican-aligned firms more favorable to Trump this cycle? Yes, … Harris is ahead by 3.0 points nationally in this simple average. But when you look at only Republican-aligned firms, she’s up by only 2.0 points. Removing those polls from the average brings Harris up to a 3.4 point national lead. These aren’t huge differences, but they’re not nothing. Combined with a similar pattern in state-level averages, polls from Republican-leaning firms could push polling averages — and by extension forecasts — rightward.
This last sentence is important so I’ll repeat it,
Combined with a similar pattern in state-level averages, polls from Republican-leaning firms could push polling averages — and by extension forecasts — rightward.
Of course Nate believes, as you state, that he’s able to account for it by adjusting for the house effects and such. Which would overcome the flood.
He then seems to go on and justify that his house effects are accurate by comparing with pollsters whose averages are excluding Republican polls (thus avoiding the bias completely) and saying that he winds up with the same result as them.
However, it’s really interesting to note that most of the polling averages he compares with don’t include as many GOP polls.
In fact it’s Nate’s own average that is the lowest in favor of Harris. In fact I think 538 is the only other one that does even include those GOP polls.
And somehow these are the ones that show the GOP candidate with a lead.
In fact, VoteHub - the one using only high quality nonpartisan polls - actually has Harris winning the Electoral College currently., 270 vs 268: https://polls.votehub.com/
Electoral College average
Harris 270, Trump 268
National Average
Harris +2.3
Tipping Point (MI)
Harris +0.1
Electoral College Bias
R +2.2Now Nate can easily justify this as a tiny difference within the margin of error. And he’s be right, of course. But I feel that this shows, even after all the hard and brilliant work by Nate and folks, the flooding by the GOP polls seem to be off by just enough to push things over the edge. Ignore them for more accurate data, and the picture looks different.
Lol at people downvoting what they don’t want to hear.
Credibility: High - Factual Reporting: High
On a positive note, Harris is still leading 4/7 swing states in the WaPo averages: https://www.washingtonpost.com/elections/interactive/2024/presidential-polling-averages/
It’s because right-wing pollsters are flooding the landscape with fudged polls. They’re literally all liars, why do we trust their polling methodologies. Seems to me they’re just setting up for the eventual loss so they can point to this polling during the Steal 2.0.
Just fucking vote. Polls don’t win elections. Plus, the majority of the most recent polls are backed by red wavers. I wouldn’t put much stock into them regardless, but especially not the most recent ones.
Polling aggregators like Nate Silver and 538 take those Republican leans into account.
You can read about it and their methodology here:
https://www.natesilver.net/p/are-republican-pollsters-flooding
Edit: lol, love the “I was told there would be no fact checking” attitude on the downvotes.
They’re already getting ready with the same excuses they used for Hillary. If Kamala loses, it definitely can’t be a result of the fact that Dems seem to actively despise the left.
No matter what Nate says and how many times you link his website, polls do not matter.
ETA: maybe, just maybe, you’re being downvoted because you keep linking the same article from the same pollster to defend polling.
How is anyone planning on voting for this giant piece of shit? 2016? Ok I could sympathize with one or two people. But in 2024!? Jesus fuck, you have to be a real knuckle dragging hood wearing degenerate to try and make that case. How about trump and everyone that loves him just move to Texas and build a wall? I’m sure the entire world would be grateful.
I have family: TL;DR they want more Christianity in power, several specifically WASPs, and somethingsomething the end justifies the means to structure that authority.
