What's the Matter With the Polls?

By Steven Shepard, Politico

04 November 16

The run-up to Election Day might be exposing key flaws in public polling.

n the final days of the presidential race, the public polling has settled into a mostly consistent equilibrium: Hillary Clinton leads Donald Trump both nationally and in most key states, but by a narrower margin than last month, and not by enough to be assured of victory next week.

It’s been a bumpy road to that consensus, however, one marked by wildly careening results in recent days. Campaign professionals say the run-up to the election is exposing key flaws in the public polling conducted by news organizations and academic institutions.

The most obvious flaw is that the polls are overstating sudden fluctuations to the American people, say campaign pollsters whose own data is far more stable — even amid news events that rival the most creative political fiction.

“One of the reasons that I know the polling doesn’t move this much,” said Democratic pollster Nick Gourevitch, “is because any time we do a project internally using many, many interviews — the polling doesn’t move this much.”

It's not a new phenomenon: After the 2012 election, President Barack Obama's campaign bragged about its internal polling, which was far more stable relative to public polling.

While the public polls are almost uniformly more volatile than private data, the ABC News/Washington Post tracking poll — which over the past two weeks resembles a seismograph during a magnitude-8 earthquake — is taking it to another level.

The poll, which has been releasing new results daily, has swung wildly from its launch immediately after the final Clinton-Trump debate to the present time.

In the first iteration of the ABC/Post poll, conducted Oct. 20-23, Clinton led by a commanding 12-point margin, 50 percent to 38 percent. But in the following four-day rolling sample, conducted Oct. 24-27, the race had changed drastically: Clinton led Trump only by 2 points, 47 percent to 45 percent. That’s where the race stood Thursday — Clinton at 49 percent and Trump at 47 percent. At one point earlier in the week, Trump had a 1-point advantage for a day.

Other polls also differed dramatically in October, particularly those in contested states, with some pollsters showing results that swung from survey to survey. A University of New Hampshire survey in mid-October gave Clinton a 15-point lead, but that was down to 7 points in a UNH poll two weeks later.

Now, two polls out Thursday show a neck-and-neck race in the smallest battleground on the swing-state map.

It’s a similar story in Virginia — another battleground state where Clinton has led for most of the campaign, but where new polls this week vary greatly between a solid Clinton lead and a slight Trump edge.

“The state-by-state public polls are just sort of all over the place,” said Robert Blizzard, a pollster at the Republican firm Public Opinion Strategies.

Campaign pollsters point to a handful of factors to explain the volatility of public polling, compared with their own private data.

First, public pollsters don’t apply controls to their samples for partisan inclination. That’s a point of contention: Public pollsters argue that partisanship isn’t a fixed trait and using it as a demographic parameter could predetermine the result the poll is designed to measure.

But campaign pollsters argue that this is a cause of much of the volatility — especially in states where historic turnout rates of registered partisans are relatively consistent. And when partisan inclination bounces around from poll to poll — especially around major news events — it’s mostly a function of voters choosing not to respond. In other words, when there’s bad news about Donald Trump, like his poor debate performances and the leaked audio of Trump describing how he gropes women, Republicans are less likely to participate in polls.

On the other hand, when the news is dominated by stories about Clinton’s email scandal, Democrats don’t want to respond to pollsters.

“Attitudes in high-profile races don’t shift as much as a lot of the polls show. The big question for pollsters is what do you do about that?” asked Gourevitch, the Democratic pollster, who argued against letting partisanship float from poll to poll. “I think you’re in a world where that fundamentally doesn’t work. You have to bring some assumptions to the table.”

There are also differences in sampling, or how phone pollsters assemble the pool of people they call. Campaign pollsters now, almost uniformly, conduct internal polls using lists of registered voters and sometimes filter according to vote history to restrict the survey to more reliable voters.

Some public pollsters, like Monmouth University and Siena College, are also using what is called registration-based sampling. Still, many public pollsters instead use random-digit dialing, contacting Americans by randomly calling phone numbers and then applying a model to discern which respondents are most likely to cast ballots.

Many of those models are based on how enthusiastic voters say they are to support their preferred candidate. When the ABC/Post tracking poll launched, it was the day after the final debate, in which Trump wouldn’t commit to honoring the results of the election, win or lose.

By the time FBI Director James Comey informed Congress his agency was investigation additional Clinton emails, enthusiasm had swung toward Trump, and more of his voters were making it through the likely voter screen.

That’s similar to the nonresponse bias that could result in even more wild swings in the final days. With both parties investing so much to turn out voters in key states — Clinton and Democrats have the more sophisticated operation, by most accounts — even many of the voters who say they are somewhat less enthusiastic might cast ballots on Election Day or in early voting.

“I’m very skeptical of using enthusiasm or strength of support for any kind of likely voter screen,” said Gourevitch.

Ultimately, with the volatile national polling and inconsistent state polling, most practitioners are focused more on their own private data — even though public polling can shape coverage of the race in the final week.

Gourevitch, the Democratic pollster, said the most recent polls were conducted in the wake of Comey’s letter to Congress, when Democrats were likely less motivated to participate. The next wave of polling this weekend may show any effect of Comey’s letter ebbing, or it may show hardening perceptions of both candidates. “I would pay attention to field dates,” he cautioned.

Meanwhile, Blizzard, the Republican pollster, is largely ignoring national polls like the ABC/Post tracking poll, or the one-off CBS News/New York Times poll.

“I don’t really pay as much attention to the national stuff because it’s mostly directional,” Blizzard said, pointing to trends that tend to coincide with movements in the states. “This is not truly a national election.”

Without a Modernized Voting Rights Act, There's No Such Thing as an Honest Election

By Jim Sensenbrenner, The Washington Post

04 November 16

Jim Sensenbrenner, a Republican from Wisconsin, is a member of the U.S. House of Representatives

n Tuesday, Americans will elect a president without the full protections of the Voting Rights Act. The last time that happened they were deciding between Lyndon Johnson and Barry Goldwater — more than a half-century ago.

In 2013, the Supreme Court declared that voter discrimination was no longer a problem and effectively struck down the only portion of the act designed to stop discrimination before it affects an election. The court let stand the provisions of the act that allow lawsuits after a discriminatory law takes effect, but unfortunately, the United States has learned the hard way that there is no satisfactory cure for discrimination after an election occurs.

At issue is a practice known as preclearance. Under the 1965 law, jurisdictions with a history of discrimination had to submit changes in voting practices to the Justice Department for review. But in 2013’s Shelby County v. Holder, the Supreme Court struck down the trigger used to determine which jurisdictions would be subject to preclearance, effectively removing this safeguard.

Along with Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) and Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), I introduced the Voting Rights Amendment Act of 2015 to modernize the original law and to respond to the Supreme Court’s objections in Shelby County. The bill recognizes the importance of preclearance, but applies it evenly across all 50 states. Under the new law, any state or jurisdiction that demonstrates a consistent pattern of discriminatory voting practices would be subject to preclearance. When the discrimination stops, the jurisdiction would automatically be freed from the requirement. This bill offers a modern and thoughtful response to voter discrimination that ensures the minimal possible federal interference in state elections. Unfortunately, despite the legislation having more than 100 co-sponsors, Congress still has not acted on it.

If opponents take issue with the details of how preclearance would operate or the way the bill defines consistent discrimination, I will happily work with them on changes. But to not act at all suggests they believe that Congress should not allow federal oversight of local elections no matter how discriminatory and unfair those elections are. I do not believe that is an acceptable position.

The country is already suffering from Congress’s failure to modernize the Voting Rights Act. Without the full law in place, Americans face unnecessary legal battles, confusion and inefficiency at the polls, and a potentially discriminatory election process.

To date, there have been a number of significant cases brought against states regarding election laws — some with litigation still pending as Election Day approaches. The case League of Women Voters et al. v. the State of North Carolina challenged the state’s new voting laws, which implemented a state voter identification requirement and made changes to early voting and same-day voter registration practices. In early October, the Florida Democratic Party filed suit against Gov. Rick Scott and Secretary of State Ken Detzner seeking to extend the voter registration deadline in the wake of Hurricane Matthew. In Arizona, litigants brought suit against the Arizona secretary of state’s office, challenging polling-place closures in Maricopa County, which reduced locations by 70 percent since 2012 — opening only 60 polling stations in the 2016 primary election compared with more than 200 in 2012 and 400 in 2008.

Under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, each of these cases would have been reviewed directly by the Justice Department, eliminating the need for costly litigation and ensuring that election laws were settled before Election Day. The Voting Rights Amendment Act of 2015 would not only restore Section 5 and preclearance practices, but also help relieve complications caused by state and local changes to voting laws. It would modernize the VRA to apply to all states equally and include transparency provisions, such as requiring officials to give public notice within 48 hours of certain voting changes that are made 180 days before a federal election. This would help reduce hours-long wait times for voters, give the public ample time to adjust to changes in polling locations and secure proper identification in states that require it.

At the core of the Voting Rights Act is the desire for equality in elections. I supported the act’s reauthorization in 1982, was instrumental in its reauthorization in 2006 and now urge my colleagues to pass the Voting Rights Amendment Act of 2015 during the upcoming lame-duck session.

The opportunity to reauthorize the VRA for the 2016 election has passed, but enacting the Voting Rights Amendment Act of 2015 would be an enlightened congressional response to what has been an ugly presidential race.

The right to vote is fundamental to a successful, prosperous nation. It is imperative that the process is fair, accessible and protected from discrimination, doubt and partisan gamesmanship. If voters are worried about rigged elections, Congress must act with urgency to pass the Voting Rights Amendment Act of 2015.