The Selzer Poll and the case for a Trump loss

My biggest takeaways from Selzer’s interview with Halperin today:

1. Her polling style is “old school” and expensive. She has real people make the calls.

2. She doesn’t try to anchor her results to past elections, e.g. if Republicans made up 60% of the vote last election she isn’t trying make the results of her poll reflect a same or similar vote share. She simply asks respondents did you already vote or definitely plan to vote and lets those respondents speak for themselves with, according to her, minimal weighting. The way she describes it is she is trying to “look forward” not back.

Reading up on her past results a little - guess who the polling outlier was in Iowa in 2020 but got it the most right? Selzer (DM Register):





Lastly, she mentioned Indiana 2008 as an example of when a state had a big swing from one election to the next. GWB won Indiana in 2004 by 20%. In 2008, the RCP average had McCain +1.4 and Selzer’s final 2008 Indiana poll had Obama +1. Obama won by 1%. Point is, states can and do swing big from one election to the next.

So what do I take from the Selzer Iowa poll? It’s just one data point and should be taken with a big grain of salt. But what it may be shedding light on is that there may be a significant slice of the electorate that would otherwise be voting R but will not be voting R for whatever reason. You have the Trump polarization effect, the fallout of Roe, the stupid MSG thing swaying a few normie sheep, a few Haley Republicans not coming home, a few people still in their feelings about Jan 6th… All these things by themselves would likely not be enough to tip an election, but cumulatively could they?

When Trump beat Hillary, he had a lot going for him. Comey, the release of all those emails, the fact we just had two D terms, Hillary being super entitled and unlikeable… yet he barely beat her. The margin for error was always going to be thin.

My prediction at this moment is Trump still wins with a narrow victory in PA, but I don’t like what that Selzer poll MAY be trying to tell us.