Column: An old idea that could have helped pollsters Americans cast their votes during the U.S. presidential election in Elyria, Ohio. Photo by Aaron Josefczyk/Reuters The failure of almost all the public opinion polls to correctly predict the winner in the 2016 presidential election is disturbing and perplexing. But it provides an opportunity to look at an alternative method of polling that has worked in the past, and that I took part in as a graduate student in Columbia University half a century ago. This time around, the pre-election Monday morning quarterbacking regarding the almost universal predictions that Hillary Clinton would win the presidency by anywhere from 3 to 6 percent points the finger at the usual suspects: people using cell phones, their refusal to talk to pollsters, the difficulty of making contact with young people or people without phones, the inability to predict who is a likely voter and who is not. READ MORE: How the mainstream media missed Trump’s momentum I did.
Election 2016: Exit Polls Data for 2016 were collected by Edison Research for the National Election Pool, a consortium of ABC News, The Associated Press, CBSNews, CNN, Fox News and NBC News. The voter survey is based on questionnaires completed by 24,537 voters leaving 350 voting places throughout the United States on Election Day including 4,398 telephone interviews with early and absentee voters. In 2012, 2008 and 2004, the exit poll was conducted by Edison/Mitofsky; in 1996 and 2000 by Voter News Services; in 1992 by Voter Research and Surveys; and in earlier years by The New York Times and CBS News. Direct comparisons from year to year should factor in differences in how questions were asked. Population scaling is representative of the number of voters in each category. *Change is shown in percentage points.
How One 19-Year-Old Illinois Man Is Distorting National Polling Averages Alone, he has been enough to put Mr. Trump in double digits of support among black voters. He can improve Mr. Trump’s margin by 1 point in the survey, even though he is one of around 3,000 panelists. He is also the reason Mrs. How has he made such a difference? It’s worth noting that this analysis is possible only because the poll is extremely and admirably transparent: It has published a data set and the documentation necessary to replicate the survey. Not all of the poll’s choices were bound to help Mr. Tiny Groups, Big Weights Just about every survey is weighted — adjusted to match the demographic characteristics of the population, often by age, race, sex and education, among other variables. The U.S.C. ■ It weights for very tiny groups, which results in big weights. A typical national survey usually weights to make sure it’s representative across pretty broad categories, like the right number of men or the right number of people 18 to 29. The U.S.C. A run of the U.S.C. The U.S.C. Photo
How Trump And Race Are Splitting Evangelicals The Rev. Billy Graham, the pastor and evangelical leader who died last week and is being laid to rest in Charlotte on Friday, built relationships across party lines, illustrated by the praise Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump delivered after his death. But it likely will be hard for an evangelical Christian figure in this era to get the kind of bipartisan acclaim that Graham received in life and in death. America’s community of self-described evangelicals, about a fourth of the population, is increasingly divided between a more conservative, Trump-aligned bloc deeply worried about losing the so-called culture wars; and a bloc that is more liberal on issues like immigration, conscious of the need to appeal to nonwhite Christians and wary of the president. The split in evangelical Christianity isn’t new, but it appears to be widening under Trump. Two factors appear to be driving this divide. The white conservative camp The diverse non-Republican camp
Report: ‘Clean Missouri’ repeal could dilute minority representation in state Capitol | Politics Every 10 years, political districts around the nation are redrawn to make sure they are equal in population. Currently, all 50 states use total population when doing this, which ensures that everyone is considered when drawing district boundaries. Amendment 3 would make Missouri the first state in the nation to exclude children and noncitizens from the map-making process. In the report, Yurij Rudensky, redistricting lawyer in the Brennan Center's Democracy Program, said the change could have an outsized effect on minorities. Whites make up roughly 79.5 percent of all Missourians but more than 83 percent of adult citizens. “Thus, under adult citizen apportionment, the white population would account for a larger percentage of those counted for representation than it does under total population apportionment,” the analysis notes. It also wouldn’t account for children turning 18 over the course of the decade the maps are in place, allowing for swings in population within certain districts.
untitled The Census Bureau on Thursday issued its most detailed portrait yet of how the U.S. has changed over the past decade, releasing a trove of demographic data that will be used to redraw political maps across an increasingly diverse country. The census figures have been eagerly awaited by states, and they are sure to set off an intense partisan battle over representation at a time of deep national division and fights over voting rights. The numbers could help determine control of the U.S. House in the 2022 elections and provide an electoral edge for the next decade. The figures show continued migration to the South and Southwest and population losses in the Mississippi Delta and Appalachia. The data comes from compiling forms filled out last year by tens of millions of Americans, with the help of census takers and government statisticians to fill in the blanks when forms were not turned in or questions were left unanswered. Communities of color have been undercounted in past censuses.
CNN Poll: Most Americans feel democracy is under attack in the US Nearly all Americans feel that democracy in the US is at least being tested: 93% total say that democracy is either under attack (56%) or being tested but not under attack (37%). A scant 6% say that American democracy is in no danger. Republicans are far more likely than Democrats to say that democracy is under attack, and that view is most prevalent among those who support former President Donald Trump. All told, 75% of Republicans say democracy is under attack, compared with 46% of Democrats. And Republicans who support Trump continue to drive belief in the big lie that the 2020 election was stolen from him. Among Republicans, 78% say that Biden did not win and 54% believe there is solid evidence of that, despite the fact that no such evidence exists. Looking to future elections, 51% of all Americans say it's at least somewhat likely that an election in the next few years will be overturned by elected officials because their party lost, while 49% say that is unlikely.
Public trust in government remains low, Public trust in government remains low, as it has for much of the 21st century. Only two-in-ten Americans say they trust the government in Washington to do what is right “just about always” (2%) or “most of the time” (19%). Trust in the government has declined somewhat since last year, when 24% said they could trust the government at least most of the time. Public trust in government near historic lows Pew Research Center When the National Election Study began asking about trust in government in 1958, about three-quarters of Americans trusted the federal government to do the right thing almost always or most of the time. Today, 29% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents say they trust government just about always or most of the time, compared with 9% of Republicans and Republican-leaners. Throughout Donald Trump’s tenure as president, more Republicans than Democrats reported trusting the government, though that has flipped since Joe Biden’s election.