If a slogan or term was hurting dem down ballot that bad polling SHOULD HAVE picked up on it.

[uponit7771]

Please STOP Normalizing horrid down ballot polling with anecdotes about slogans and terms.

Look, no other developed country has had polling this inaccurate for this long tilted towards one party, *** NONE ]***. Even when polling accounts for lack or abundance of types of phones, lack of honesty, shyness or anything else you can think of cause (polling data can weight all that) US polling has gotten it too wrong for too long.

Polling is mostly a science, not art and that science being this off in 2020 down ballots should be explained and the polling firms be held accountable.

Polling is important, if a slogan or term were overall denting approval of a candidate they need to be able to react to it properly. So far there's no data that a slogan or term explains down ballot aggregate polling being being this bad for a second presidential election in a row.

We need to hold the political information outlets and polling firms account for horrible polling, the fact that we're guessing the detriment of a slogan on dem down ballots is a tell tale itself somethings very very off.

what say you?

thx in advance

[aeromanKC]

1. Polling seemed to be more accurate when we had paper ballots

[pandr32]

4. +1

[uponit7771]

10. +1, especially the exit polling which is now being ignored

[betsuni]

16. Yes.

[mcar]

23. We have paper ballots in FL

Polling sucked.

[Beakybird]

2. I'd say that we shouldn't rush to judgment about what went wrong.

Was it bad polling?
Was it malfeasance with ballot counting?
Was it the power of misinformation?
Was it bad messaging?

It will take several months for data scientists to figure out what factors were most responsible for the Democrats' underperformance.

[ancianita]

3. Are you sure that there were no polls on "defund police" and "socialism"? I thought I saw some.

I could be wrong, but even if there are, there's no poll or correlation made between the phrase polls and if those were key reasons the down ballot votes went Republican.

So in general, I agree with you. Whether these flogged issues make us nervous, doesn't mean down ballot votes would have been any different.

[Stinky The Clown]

5. As I recall it, there WAS polling . . . . . FOR those issues, NOT for their impact on the election.

[ancianita]

6. I kinda thought so. I can find them, but am taking a break from polls for awhile.

[uponit7771]

11. Right, I didn't see any polling attributing to policy positions of down ballot candidates or Biden

[unblock]

7. How can everyone know about all the voter suppression and still be surprised when polls are off.

Pollsters keep having to adjust their models to account for the ever-changing suppression.

You can't easily just ask people prior to an election if their vote has been suppressed because they often don't know yet.

They think they're still registered, they think they gave the right address, they think they'll be able to get to the polling location easily, they think they'll be able to vote on their lunch break, they think their id is considered valid or that they can get one easily and free, etc.

It's often not until Election Day that they find out they can't vote.

And shockingly, these tend to be people in democratic areas or with names that sound like maybe they're democrats.

[Hoyt]

14. Are there any polls or reports of more than a handful of people

showing up at polls and not being able to vote? It’s too easy to check one’s registration nowadays.

[unblock]

19. Haven't checked lately, but plenty of people don't know or bother to check

Even if they do know, I'm not sure pollsters are asking or if they'd get the right answers.

I'm guessing many people figure they'll be able to fix whatever "clerical issue" there may be preventing them from voting but maybe that never happens. And people might not know to get a provisional ballot or might not be able to supply the documentation needs to make it valid.

I agree that some of this has improved, at least the availability of information. But I don't know if that's enough to help the polls.

[stopdiggin]

20. this is all completely off the cuff

as is the OP. It's simplistic to claim that the entire down ballot issue was due to one (or two) particular slogans. It's also simplistic to attempt to write them off with the argument -- "because - polls!"

There were a heck of a lot of things going on in this election -- including the fact that it turns out a certain amount of black and brown skinned voters, and suburban white women for that matter -- kinda' like the macho, tellin' it like it is, trade wars are easy, stickin' it to the libs! -- Trump brand. Unfortunate as hell -- but them's the truth, brother.

[Hoyt]

22. I definitely agree with that -- "sticking it to libs."

[Klaralven]

8. The polls showed about 40% for and 60% against "defund the police"

Overall, questions that seemed to emphasize how police departments would be affected found less support. Reuters/Ipsos respondents who were familiar with “proposals to completely dismantle police departments and give more financial support to address homelessness, mental health, and domestic violence” said they opposed those proposals, 58 percent to 39 percent. That was virtually identical to the way respondents broke down in the pollster’s question about the “‘defund the police’ movement.” And finally, per ABC News/Ipsos, 39 percent supported and 60 percent opposed “reducing the budget of the police department in your community, even if that means fewer police officers, if the money is shifted to programs related to mental health, housing, and education.” That made the specific proposal slightly more popular than “the movement to ‘defund the police’” (34 percent support vs. 64 percent opposition), but the difference was well within the pollster’s margin of error.

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/americans-like-the-ideas-behind-defunding-the-police-more-than-the-slogan-itself/

Poll: Sanders Rises, But Socialism Isn't Popular With Most Americans

Asked about their impression of socialism, 28% of adults said they have a favorable view, while 58% said they had an unfavorable one.

https://www.npr.org/2020/02/19/807047941/poll-sanders-rises-but-socialism-isnt-popular-with-most-americans

[uponit7771]

12. Those terms or slogans weren't attributed to 95% of dem candidates, they were slogans not policy

... that dems overwhelming owned.

There's no data showing that's the reason polling was so off and it should show some data that those terms affected dem down ballot candidates,...

there wasn't any.

There still isn't any either.

[Hoyt]

17. "Defund the Police" is one of the issues GOPers are advertising against

Democratic Senatorial candidates in Georgia. Warnock has some good rebuttals, but it is definitely an issue.

Socialism, Marxism, etc., are included in a lot of GOPer attack ads.

My guess, and sorrow, is that it will likely be effective in runoffs. I hope not enough, but . . . . .

[Yavin4]

9. My question is, why do the campaigns have more accurate polling than the media outlets?

What are they doing polling wise that these media outlets are not doing?

[uponit7771]

13. +1, I remember Biden's campaign manager saying their polling had them closer than medias polling.

Also, how did the polling in SC get it so wrong where Harrison put over 50 million in his campaign and lost big time.

Did Harrison know the polling outside of his campaign was off?

Really strange in this country we get the polling so off for so long

[world wide wally]

15. The most logical theory I have heard was when someone wrote that the meth heads

are never polled because they stay out of the mix and live in the woods and abandoned building and other out of the way places. They have no permanent addresses by which to find them. Then they show up on election day to vote Republican because they think it is freedumb to vote that way.
When you think about it, it makes sense.

[sweetloukillbot]

18. Maybe not even that...

They were expecting a big turnout on the Dem side, but I don't think anyone was expecting so huge a turnout on the Republican side. If the polls were weighted as such, I'd think they'd look the way the polling did before the election.

And I think a lot of the "Never Trumpers" were still Republicans at heart, and voted downballot accordingly. That seems to have borne out in Arizona.

[stopdiggin]

21. oh, absolutely! plenty of people split their ticket.

And will be voting R whether Obamacare is saving their life or not. Just because they're not real keen on a guy that wears diapers and ladles on the face makeup -- doesn't mean they given up on deregulation, 2nd amend, tax breaks and right to life! Please don't fool yourself!