Why Trump's Approval May Be Inflated

[RandySF]

A new Pew Research study finds bogus respondents make up between 4% and 7% of participants in opt-in online surveys in the United States.

Washington Post: “If bogus respondents are not detected and removed, Pew found, polls using opt-in online samples may overestimate approval of Trump and other political figures and policies by about two percentage points. That fairly small impact can be meaningful for presidents like Trump facing a close reelection bid, and are amplified for certain subgroups, including Hispanics.”



https://politicalwire.com/2020/02/18/why-trumps-approval-may-be-inflated/

[krissey]

1. I just absolutely believe it is. I come in contact with lots of people daily who freely discuss.

I have had maybe 1 in a thousand liking Trump, or wider margin, because who could calculate that. I am in all blue, for sure. But, there is a lot of surrounding red. My very Republican two bosses thought he ought to be removed with impeachment.

[Mr.Bill]

23. I was in a bar yesterday afternoon in my slightly blue

northern California small town. Some homeless drunk came in and started ranting about how he was running for President of the United States and asked everyone to write him in on the ballot. He was so drunk/drugged he was difficult to understand at times. He left as quickly as he had arrived and I said loudly "I'm voting for him, he's better than what we have now." It got a huge laugh from everyone in the room.

[krissey]

25. That is funny

[onethatcares]

29. hell, I'll vote for him

but, how do you spell write in?

[dewsgirl]

2. 100 percent, the one poll that was somewhat honest, was

ironically the Fox news polls, can't say that anymore.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

3. 2018 showed that Trump was massively unpopular

I'm not sure what we're facing in 2020. His polling has never gone much beyond the low 40's though, but, as many experts are suggesting, he's not trying to win the popularity contest, just carving up the vote enough to win the EC, like he did in 2016, although with some help from spoiler candidates like Gary Johnson and Jill Stein, who AFAIK are not running this year (and people would hopefully be smart enough to not vote for again). Trump's main mission in 2020 is going to be making the Democratic nominee more unpalatable than himself (which would have to be a very tall order) and/or to suppress/depress the Democratic vote to the point that Democrats don't show up to the polls or can't vote. In short, the GOP is going to cheat like hell.

[leftieNanner]

7. I saw a report out of Illinois

That he is pushing blue states to increase Republican turnout so his big fat ego wins the popular vote.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

24. Electronic devices help the GOP to cheat.

We need paper ballots everywhere.

[2naSalit]

28. +1000000000000000000!!!

[rampartc]

26. there will be a green and a libertarian candidate

probably Howie Hawkins for the greens, but they are having primaries and caucuses in most states.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

30. *uck

[0rganism]

4. "close reelection bid"

the horse race narrative has taken root... again

[Wounded Bear]

5. It always does...

they absolutely don't want a wipeout. It screws up their ratings.

[johnthewoodworker]

15. You need to have some close polls so when the republicans steal the

election they will have something to point towards as indicating this was tight. If you think electronic voting is foolproof just google it.

[Wellstone ruled]

6. Okay,nuf said about polls.

You now see the evidence.

[bucolic_frolic]

8. I'd bet it's inflated WAY MORE than that

Witness the number and ferocity of replies to online message boards on Yahoo, Twitter replies to liberal positions, and business/finance media. Some of them they trounce the opposition 600 to 1! Literally. Likes/dislikes 600 to 1. So there is a lot of paid, redundant people, often running 37 IDs or with 10 paid/volunteers doing the same thing.

They are skewing Democratic polls too! No doubt in my mind.

[11 Bravo]

9. Historically upside down, yet still inflated.

Yeah, that sounds about right.

[ancianita]

10. If any polling group can explain polling validity and reliability, it's Pew. Good for them for

Last edited Tue Feb 18, 2020, 05:22 PM - Edit history (1)

looking into this.

[OliverQ]

11. I see so many comments

from people on social media who say they're done with the GOP and they're switching to Dems. His approval in various states has dropped significantly since 2016. It just doesn't make sense that his national approval has not gone down at all.

[ToxMarz]

12. The easy solution is to label these polls clearly that they use "opt-in online samples"

Then we know to simply disregard them. Whether the results are overestimated or underestimated becomes irrelevant.

[lagomorph777]

21. +1 I don't think there's any legitimate way to do an online poll.

[Midnight Writer]

22. Agreed. A sample that has to "opt in" will not be representative.

[Corgigal]

13. Cohen told us all this.

Corrupt people, know how to corrupt.

[Marie Marie]

14. I don't think Trump is popular enough to win re-election bu I do think

that they could cheat their way towards re-election. That is what keeps me up at night.

[Rabrrrrrr]

16. opt-in polls are also too much self-selective, so not to be fully trusted.

But of course the GOP are spamming everything they possibly can to make their fuhrer look more popular than he is.

[calimary]

17. K&R

[LiberalFighter]

18. Opt-in online surveys??? May be inflated?? Really? Any doubt?

[ancianita]

19. Here's Pew's own explanation of their study. It's full of break-down charts about respondents.

https://www.pewresearch.org/methods/2020/02/18/assessing-the-risks-to-online-polls-from-bogus-respondents/?fbclid=IwAR1uA71ZokLUKjTp0NzUWqdVFP0AE1BLWQgMCNoJ5m2S9LSLGmImurysyBU

[Joinfortmill]

20. Don't need to convince me

I've thought Trump's approval ratings were inflated for awhile now. Happy to hear it.

[Nitram]

27. I've been wondering about this.