The Biden team has taken up a position that winning campaigns don’t take: Claiming the polls are wrong and that they are actually winning.
My colleague Bonchie pointed out earlier this morning that a Biden campaign account posted a clip of Joe Scarborough ranting about how the New York Times/Siena College poll has “has consistently slanted toward Donald Trump” and that “The New York Times will release their poll, the political and media class will run around with their hair on fire, and then three days later polls will show a deadlocked race.”
It is one thing for a pundit to make the claim that a particular poll, especially one that has actually been one of the most consistently correct in recent years, is skewed one way or another. It’s one thing for campaign surrogates to make that claim. It’s quite another for a clearly marked campaign account to push that claim.
As Bonchie rightfully noted, it reeks of desperation.
READ MORE: Biden Campaign Desperation Sets in, Now Saying the Polls Are Fake
A separate report, this time from Axios, points out that this isn’t just campaign spin – the Biden team genuinely believes this is the case. They believe that the polling is wrong and that Biden is tied or even beating Trump.
What’s more, Axios is reporting that President Joe Biden is studying every poll, even digging into the crosstabs.
Between the lines: However he feels about all the public polls, Biden is clearly well briefed on them — and often goes deep into the cross tabs.
- “We run strongest among likely voters in the polling data,” Biden told wealthy donors in Medina on Saturday. “And while the national polls basically have us (among) registered voters up by four, (among) likely voters we’re up by more.”
- “In the last 23 national polls, I’ve been ahead in 10 of them, Trump has been ahead in eight, and we’ve been tied in five,” he said at a campaign event in Tampa, Florida., citing surveys by Marist, Echelon Insights and Marquette.
The polling, as it currently stands, essentially confirms that if the election were held today, then Donald Trump would reclaim the throne of America and Joe Biden would become a one-term wonder.
But, the election isn’t being held today. Nor is it being held tomorrow. In fact, it is six months away and a lot of things on the ground could change.
The problem for the Biden team is that those changes are poised to not look great for the president. Just today, the Producer Price Index numbers were released, showing the PPI increased 0.5 percent for the month, which was higher than the 0.3 percent Dow Jones estimate. That news doesn’t bode well for folks who were hoping for interest rate cuts this year. The border isn’t getting much better, which is a major concern for a lot of folks, especially in some swing states. The economy, in general, still has a lot of people nervous.
Of course, Democrats are still banking on the various Trump trials producing fruit for them, but it is starting to appear that it’s backfiring. More and more voters are responding to pollsters on the issue, saying they believe these cases are more political than legal. It’s just brutal for Biden if that’s the case because there is very much a public perception that his administration is directing this.
But, the worst news for Biden is that there’s a noticeable polling shift among Likely Voters – Biden held an advantage with them, but Trump is definitely catching up.
Is that last point true though? Among the full sample across all the states, no real difference between registered & likely. That effect basically just shows up in Michigan (with Trump doing better among LVs elsewhere). Seems like noise pic.twitter.com/Dohe1q1PhF
— Logan Dobson (@LoganDobson) May 14, 2024
If that one trend holds, it’s devastating for Biden. People who voted in 2020 and 2022 are more likely to vote for Biden, several polls recently showed. But if that trend is breaking, and active voters are starting to warm up to Trump, then Biden’s biggest advantage is slipping.
Given the number of voters who aren’t thrilled with re-running the 2020 campaign in 2024, it’s not difficult to imagine that this election turnout will be lower than 2020. It doesn’t seem like the average voter is particularly excited about our choices this year (and, man, do I understand that feeling), and that would make this year a race to get as many people within your own base out, not just independents. But, if that’s what this campaign will come down to, it doesn’t seem like Biden is doing great there, either.
Biden may be confident that he’s winning, but there’s very little data to support that. It’s a level of denial that is, frankly, kind of impressive while also being extremely on-brand for a guy who has been consistently wrong since taking office.
