The Polls Were Skewed Toward Democrats

For much of this election cycle, Democrats complained the polls were biased against them. They said the polls were failing to represent enough minority voters and applying overly restrictive likely-voter screens. They claimed early-voting data was proving the polls wrong. They cited the fact that polls were biased against Democrats […] Read more »

Final Update: Republicans Have A 3 In 4 Chance Of Winning The Senate

After two months of forecasting, it comes down to this: Republicans are favored to win the Senate. Their chances of doing so are 76 percent, according to FiveThirtyEight’s Senate forecast, which is principally based on an analysis of the polls in each state and the historical accuracy of Senate polling. […] Read more »

Des Moines Register pollster on criticism of Senate numbers: ‘I’ve heard it before.’

J. Ann Selzer may be the single most powerful pollster in America. She runs the Des Moines Register’s Iowa poll, the gold standard of survey research in what is the single most-watched state, politically speaking, in the country. So when Selzer’s final numbers in the heated Senate race between state […] Read more »

Getting the Latino vote wrong? Which polls are good and which polls are bad

Is it possible that Colorado’s Cory Gardner is shaping up to be this election cycle’s Sharron Angle? You might recall what happened to Angle in the Nevada Senate race in 2010. Almost every pre-election poll had Angle, the tea-party-supported Republican challenger to Senate Democratic majority leader Harry Reid, leading the […] Read more »