by Josiah Lippincott
Horriblesurging“polls are just empty air.
A close analysis of the data shows that Donald Trump continues to dominate this election. Once the systematic pro-Democratic bias in the polling data is taken into account, Trump clearly leads. As it is now, Trump is likely to win every swing state AND nationwide popular vote.
Donald Trump has consistently outperformed his state poll numbers by a huge margin. Pollsters have consistently and laughably underestimated his true approval rating. The margin of error is always the same!
The headlines that Kamala is ahead in swing states are pure propaganda. It is not enough that Kamala is “up” in these polls, she has to be up by more than systematic, pro-democracy bias in polls to actually win the election.
Let’s dive into the numbers. All of the data below comes from a survey average of 538.
In 2020, Biden polled 7.9 points ahead of Trump in Michigan. Biden won by 2.8 points. He won Arizona by 2.6 points. He won by 0.3. Biden won Georgia by 1.2. Biden won Pennsylvania by 4.7. He won by 1.2. Biden won Nevada by 4.9. He won by 2.4. Biden won North Carolina by 1.8. He lost by 1.3 points.
The most striking example is Wisconsin. In 538 2020 polls, Biden was leading by almost nine points on Election Day. Biden barely managed to pull ahead by 0.6 points after the final vote count.
On average, polls overestimated Biden’s support in key swing states in 2020 by as much as 3.6 points. This pro-Democratic bias is so forceful that it should be automatically factored in before trying to understand state and national polling data. This choice.
If we assume that the polls have the same margin of error pro-Democracy as they did in 2020, then Donald Trump would win every swing state if the election were held today. Not only that, but he would also win Virginia, where the latest polls showed him clearly beating Harris by four points.
In the table below, the numbers on the left show Kamala’s current lead in the 538 polling average. The right column shows the difference between the 2020 polling average and Biden’s actual performance. For Kamala to be in a winning position in a given state, the number on the left must be higher than the one on the right. As you can see, it just doesn’t happen:
| Michigan | 3.4 | 6.2 |
| Arizona | 0.9 | 2.3 |
| Georgia | 0.2 | 1 |
| Pennsylvania | 2.3 | 3.5 |
| Wisconsin | 3.2 | 7.8 |
| Nevada | Tie | 2.5 |
| North Carolina | -0.5 | 3.1 |
Systematic pro-democracy bias isn’t just evident in 2020 polls. It was evident in 2016, too. Below is a table comparing Hillary’s lead in polling data (left) to her final victory margin (right). Negative numbers indicate Trump’s lead.
| Michigan | 4.2 | -0.2 |
| Arizona | -2.2 | -3.5 |
| Nevada | 1.2 | 2.4 |
| Pennsylvania | 3.7 | -0.7 |
| Wisconsin | 5.3 | -0.8 |
| North Carolina | 0.7 | -2.7 |
As you can see, the 2016 polls overestimated Hillary’s lead by an average of 3.1 percentage points. If we adjust the 2024 state polls for that margin of error, we see once again that Kamala is in grave trouble.
Now, she would lose the popular vote, given the pro-Democratic bias. In 2020, national polls had Biden on average leading the popular vote by 8.4 points. But he won by only 4.5 points. That 3.9-point margin is larger than Kamala’s current 2.6-point “lead” in the national vote over Trump. That means Trump is likely to actually beat Kamala by about 1.3 points in the popular vote.
None of this should be surprising. Kamala is running a campaign that was cobbled together after Joe Biden was forced out of the race by a catastrophic collapse in support. She’s been given just three months to try to craft a winning message in an election in which Donald Trump has every advantage.
Trump’s bold response to the attempted coup has solidified his position as the frontrunner. He has never been more popular than he is now. Kamala is grasping at straws.
Democrats have gone from calling Trump the next Adolf Hitler to pretending he’s “weird.” That’s quite the rhetorical descent.
Beyond these enormous political odds, Kamala has a whole host of other problems. First, no American voter has ever voted for her nationally or in any presidential primary. Kamala is also a notoriously impoverished conversationalist. Her 2021 conversation with Lester Holt it went so wrong that Biden’s people have essentially frozen Harris’ policies for the next two years.
Kamala’s election as vice president also does her no favors. Tim Walz has a grave valor theft crisis on his hands after he claimed to have carried “weapons of war for war”despite never having been in combat. What’s more, he lied for decades about his retirement rank from the National Guard.
Kamala also has a history of saying extremely radical things publicly and on camera. She’s faint on immigration, the economy, and crime. Her supposedly forceful stance on abortion is undermined by her stance on COVID vaccines. It’s demanding to make a “my body, my choice” argument when you support firing tens of millions of Americans for not getting experimental medical treatments.
It’s clear from personal and social media support that Kamala’s most steadfast supporters are overwhelmingly women, older people, and gay men. Unfortunately for her, Kamala needs to win over heterosexual male voters. That will prove to be a towering order in an election in which she has yet to announce a single policy proposal that she hasn’t stolen from Trump.
Kamala hasn’t sat down for an interview or participated in a debate. That doesn’t bode well for her chances either. Joe Biden ran into a buzzsaw in his only face-to-face meeting with Trump, and Kamala could easily do the same. She doesn’t handle the stress of hostile questions well.
She is incredibly faint on foreign policy. Her 25-minute speech at the rally does not mention the war in Ukraine or the current conflict in Gaza. It remains to be seen how she will handle these intricate issues rhetorically, under pressure from both Donald Trump and her own base. At her rally in Detroit, she was repeatedly interrupted by pro-Palestinian protesters.
Kamala’s great hope is that the media will cover her until November and that she won’t have to campaign significantly or make any political statements. But that just won’t work.
Kamala hasn’t changed. She’s still the same politician who had to withdraw from the Democratic primary in December 2019 because her poll numbers were in the low single digits.
Conservatives should not be complacent, of course. Kamala has the backing of the entire US financial sector and media. These are powerful assets, but as recent polls show, once you factor in the systematic pro-Democratic bias in the polls, Kamala is still losing. She will almost certainly fall even further the more she exposes herself to voters without a plan.
The lesson for Republicans is clear: press the gas pedal, but don’t lose hope.
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Josiah Lippincott is a PhD candidate and former U.S. Marine Corps officer. You can find him on Telegram at https://t.me/josiah_lippincott or subscribe to his Substack Here.
Photo “Kamala Harris” by Gage Skidmore.CC BY-SA 2.0.
