mtutiger

If Selzer is, in fact, onto something that is being missed more broadly, there's gonna need to be a discussion within the polling / political media world about the constant underplaying of the abortion issue. Because this would be the third November in a row where people end up surprised at how much it matters.

It really does kinda feel like J. Ann Selzer rolled a metaphorical grenade into the discourse and has people second guessing their assumptions, doesn't it? We'll find out whose right in a couple of days, I guess....

This thread is insane.... like, we spent months and months having the NYT put out writeups definitively declaring what was or wasn't happening in the electorate, only to end up with this mishmash of hedges and caveats?

Who could have possibly predicted? lol

Even beyond her, I think the fact that the Trump Leadership Team needed to issue a memo about this poll is such a red flag to me. They know stuff that we aren't seeing. It's been obvious for a little while now.

The Governor of Iowa feels the need to weigh in.

The Trump Campaign's response to Selzer

They landed numbers in 2020 relatively accurately, but their methodology is suspect. And they have had a lot of issues in their own backyard (ie. Sao Paolo) I'll take my chances with J. Ann Selzer over those guys. I'd say the same thing if Selzer gave us a Trump +15 poll

Maybe this is a conversation better had after the votes are cast, but people really need to stop stereotyping and understand that the demographics that swung heavily toward Trump in 2016 may not have the same relationship with him today. I'm not saying it's a lot of folks, but not everybody feels the same way that they did then. And it may impact actual voting behavior. But there's a tendency if you don't spend time in rural America to assume that perceptions don't change, and that's not necessarily true.

I'll trust J. Ann Selzer and her outlier over the Brazilians who can't even get races in Brazil correct.

Pretty much. This is the thing I don't get... from a media standpoint, we have had countless articles and thinkpieces about the Barstool Bros and Young Men (including Black and Hispanic Men).... yet nobody bothered to ask about the demos that make up so much of WI/MI/PA... the WWC or where there head might be at about all this stuff. Particularly WWC women. It's insane to me. It almost seems like there are ulterior motives given the obvious story that exists.

This seems more realistic to me, yet equally devastating if it is real....

I drove past two farms in rural Kankakee/Will County IL earlier today with big Harris-Walz displays... It's not epochal or anything, but something is going on.... people are willing to put it out there, stick their neck out in a way they didn't previously.

Look, I don't think she's going to win Iowa, Selzer's poll is a clear outlier... but you cannot deny the direction that outlier is going or the degree. If she's even off by 5-6 points, it's still a Godawful result for DJT. I truly think she found something here, at least based off my own personal experiences. How much that corresponds to parts of Wisconsin or other states in areas where there are heavy WWC demos remains to be seen.

Yes.

I agree. I'm new here but need to get involved. With respect to this election, if I didn't have going kids and a job, I'd be north of the Cheddar Curtain door knocking. I've donated money, but I wish I could do more

This poll is probably an outlier to a degree, but I've driven across Northern IL and IA a bunch since moving up here last year. This just isn't surprising to me... The energy isn't there. I hope (and suspect) that transfers to Rural WI and MI in ways that helps Kamala Harris. Bigger picture, it feels like the WWC is (again) the demo that the media has ignored. This poll validates that idea

I'm in Rural IL, but the result doesn't surprise me that much. The energy isn't there...

I think more are the latter than the former, though. And that's the problem. That's the disconnect that his campaign falls into, IMO. The same story goes for the media too... a lot of people got burned by 2016, many of us included. But the political media, largely based in NY and Washington, went from "no one could possibly vote for this guy" to "those idiots in Middle America all just love this guy." And there's just way more nuance to it... believe it or not, the middle of the country has cities and suburbs and smaller cities ... the lack of contact left a blindspot in 2016 that suggested Hillary was stronger than she was, and perhaps that lack of contact sets up the same cliff that existed eight years later.

From the Alberta piece, a couple of things stood out: LaCivita/Wiles are on the right side of this - when you think back to where this race was immediately post-drop out, and with Harris as the heir apparent, it was evident to almost anyone watching that it was a race to define her. And to drive a message on the issues to prevent her from getting separation from Biden. When you fast forward to today, the project seems to have largely failed - Harris has seen her approval rating go way up to generally around even, about 10 points higher than Trump's, and in terms of policy, you have seen her on issues that were previous clear strengths for Trump (such as the economy/inflation and crime) draw to about even. Moments like the NABJ interview were an example of stepping on the message that the campaign wanted to make, and they are reaping the fallout today. This is on the candidate - the campaign, at least in the immediate aftermath of the Biden dropout, was doing the kind of messaging that it needed to, but the candidate was never interested in that. And fast forward to today, although I know it's gone mentioned and unaddressed the couple of times I've brought it up, the campaign's paid advertising is closing on things like sex changes for prisoners. Not the economy, not crime, not even immigration.... transgender ads. This low level staffer, responsible for the social media strategy geared toward younger men, is apparently the nexus for two of the largest **** ups that this campaign has experienced since July. Which is crazy.

I always kinda hold it against Alberta that he wrote a snide pre-mortem about Beto O'Rourke's campaign (which ended up far more successful than he envisioned in that piece - his sources were speculating low double digits and it ended with Cruz only winning by ~2.). Just a reminder that you cannot depend on your opponents incompetence, you gotta run through the tape.

We butt heads a lot these days, but I agree here... Texas is a stretch, but both the Senate/President are likely going to be closer than Florida will be

They're one of the rare beer restaurant chains that actually makes good beer... BJ's Brewhouse, not so much

I would add that Trump mildly underperforming in Ohio does make me curious about what Selzer finds going on in Iowa... people will probably overread whatever she puts out, but I do think it could provide a decent benchmark for rural white voters in an election where we are mostly flying blind with this demographic.

I guess anything is possible, but in terms of polling average or how the campaigns are approaching the state, I don't see a lot of evidence that it's competitive. Especially with the possibility of 270-268, one would expect Trump to be spending money (or even a little time) in the state if they thought they could flip it.