The Polling Glut - Rob Horowitz

The Polling Glut - Rob Horowitz

As has become a ritual after every presidential election, there have been plentiful columns and painstaking analysis on the accuracy of the public polling as well as the probabilistic forecasting that is in large measure based on polling averages.  The understandable main focus: did the polls get the horserace right nationally and in the battleground states. 

 

When factoring in that all polls are snapshots which cannot capture last-minute movement after the window for polling closes, the consensus verdict is that the polling in this presidential election was fairly accurate. As a whole, pollsters did a better job in 2024 than in 2020 and 2016. In those elections, Trump outperformed the pre-election polls by several percentage points.

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The most important problem created by the glut of public polling in presidential elections, however, is not whether they come sufficiently close to the final outcome; it’s that the polls dominate the media coverage, crowding out news and analysis of the candidates’ policy positions, background and character.  It seemed that every new national or battleground state's poll served as the prime news hook for newspaper articles, television news segments, and cable television panel discussions.

 

It is the case that so-called horserace coverage--in which campaigns are covered in much the same way as sporting events with the lion’s share of the coverage devoted to whose ahead and why-- has been the predominant mode of presidential election reporting since Teddy White pioneered it in the 1960 election between JFK and Nixon.  The increasing slew of public polls, as well as the media’s decision to make them the prime focus of coverage, though, has supercharged this trend, leaving little room for imparting information that would be far more useful in deciding upon for whom to vote.

 

Research shows that people actually learn more about the candidates’ issue positions from television commercials than they do from news coverage.  This is in large measure because news coverage is largely bereft of information about the candidates’ policies and proposals. It is far more essential for voters to learn about the candidates’ policy differences on Ukraine or their overall foreign policy outlooks, for instance, than incremental movements in the polls usually within the margin of error nationally or in a battleground state.  Yet, what gets saturation level coverage are these slight movements in public opinion polling—not major policy disagreements.

 

I am not arguing that there is no place for public opinion polling in election coverage. In addition to the state of the horserace, well-designed polls give us valuable information about what issues the public deems most important, perceptions of the candidates on issues and leadership qualities, how various demographic sub-groups are viewing the election, and whether 3rd party and independent candidates are gaining traction, among other valuable insights.  As part of well-rounded election coverage, public opinion polls have a role to play.

 

The problem is that the polls in all their plentitude drive and dominate the coverage.  This is a disservice to voters and results in a less informed electorate. Next time, let’s hope one or more of the major cable or broadcast networks or a popular streaming alternative break away from the pack and give us the broader coverage of the candidates and their positions that the American public needs—and that it gains the audience it deserves.