Gordon L. Weil
To ward against underestimating support for Donald Trump, many
pollsters adjust their survey findings to increase the influence of how voters
say they voted in the last election, according to a report by Nate Cohn, the
New York Times chief polling analyst.
According to the report, though the pollsters have their own
doubts about the validity of this recall-vote adjustment, they use it to avoid
the possibility of badly missing the true outcome. In short, they try to narrow their possible
error and may try not to differ from the herd.
One major defect of the adjustment is that there’s a bias in
remembering that you voted for the winner, he says. But there might also be a bias for “changing”
your vote, if the candidate’s later actions cause you to regret how you voted. In any case, voters may not provide a correct
answer.
In effect, the implicit conclusion in making this adjustment
is that one election is like another.
With Trump running for a third time, the temptation to reach that conclusion
may be great. And it might be correct.
But what about the possibility that this election is different
from most elections? Kamala Harris is
not white and not male. Those are pretty
big differences from the past.
And when the Supreme Court toppled Roe v. Wade, it was like a
constitutional amendment. It not only awakened
the opposition of many women, but it raised questions about the meaning of personal
freedom. The issue won’t fade away.
Texas, with one of the strictest laws in the country,
challenged the power of the federal government to order it to save lives,
claiming it already had such a requirement. But the legal risks for doctors
making the life-and-death decision are so great that many won’t perform abortions. Today, the Supreme Court using its phantom docket (decisions with no
reasons given) upheld the Texas position and further fueled the issue.
The abortion issue is likely to bring out women to the
ballot box. They may be more numerous
than in the past, and they may recruit others.
A majority of voters are women.
The defection of leading Republicans from Trump, despite
having endorsed him eight and four years ago, suggests that the recall-vote
adjustment does not apply to them. Perhaps other traditional Republicans will follow
them. We might call this the “Liz Cheney
effect,” for which no adjustment is made.
There is a wave of new voter registrations this year, as in
Maine, and especially among young voters.
How does the recall-vote adjustment work when the margin of victory in a
swing state may be less than the number of new voters? We might call this the “Taylor
Swift effect,” for which no adjustment was made.
At the end of his analysis, Cohn writes, “A near repeat of
the last presidential election is certainly a plausible outcome. In today’s
polarized era, who could possibly be surprised by a repeat in Mr. Trump’s third
presidential run?” He concludes, “But if
this election is different, in any direction, this year’s polls might not be
able to see it coming.” The pollsters
are not reporting data; they are manipulating it.
Another conclusion may be that the pollsters are more interested
in protecting their reputations than in making a serious attempt at
understanding the electorate. They may
fail at both.
