Stupid Polling Tricks

Making mountains of molehills.

POLITICO National Political Correspondent Brakkton Booker reports, “Trump is getting record levels of support among young Black and Latino men.”

A new poll that includes large oversamples of young voters of color shows Donald Trump has massively increased his support among groups that he previously performed poorly with in 2020.

It underscores some of the challenges Kamala Harris has had connecting with younger male voters — a demographic that typically breaks for Democrats, but is showing signs of shifting away from the party this election cycle.

We’ve seen evidence of this shift for years now but up until now it’s been relatively small.

The GenForward survey, which ran from Sept. 26 to Oct. 6 by the University of Chicago and included 2,359 eligible voters 18 to 40 years old, included some fascinating findings:

  • A quarter of young Black men are supporting Trump. (Black men overall backed President Joe Biden nearly nine to one in 2020.)
  • 44 percent of young Latino men said they’d back Trump, an improvement over the roughly 38 percent who backed him in 2020. 

I’m not sure I’d characterize a shift between 38 and 44 percent among Latino men in a poll with a 5.56 margin of error “massive.” Or, you know, statistically significant. But, certainly, a shift between 9 percent and ~25 percent among young black men would indeed be huge.

Of course, it’s just one poll. It shows 26 percent of Black males say they plan to vote for Trump, but I can’t find the breakdown by age cohort. While the margin of error among Black respondents is 4.93 percent, I have no idea what it is for young Black males; presumably, it is considerably higher.

For that matter, I’m not quite sure what we’re comparing. Is the 9 percent the actual 2020 vote, as determined by exit polling? That may well not be comparable to a survey of intended behavior taken a month out.

This, though, just made me laugh out loud:

  • For her part, Harris is at 58 percent with Black men, 37 percent with Latinos and 57 percent with Asian American and Pacific Islander men.
  • Kamala Harris is doing incredibly well among women of color. A majority of Black (63 percent), Asian American and Pacific Islander (60 percent) and Latina (55 percent) women say they will vote for Harris.

So . . . Harris is doing 5 points better with Black men, 2 percent better with Latino men, and and 3 percent better with AAPI men than with women of the same cohorts. Which is to say, within the margin of polling error for all those groups. And yet one is a massive shift and the other is “doing incredibly well.”

  • White women are nearly evenly split between Harris (44 percent) and Trump (40 percent). 

And, yet, here, 44-40 is (correctly) assessed as “nearly evenly split.”

FILED UNDER: Gender Issues, Public Opinion Polls, Race and Politics, US Politics, , , , , ,
James Joyner
About James Joyner
James Joyner is a Professor of Security Studies. He's a former Army officer and Desert Storm veteran. Views expressed here are his own. Follow James on Twitter @DrJJoyner.

Comments

  1. DK says:

    Which is to say, within the margin of polling error for all those groups. And yet one is a massive shift and the other is “doing incredibly well.”

    Because there will be no deviation from the Beltway narrative, consistency be damned.

    Speaking of polls, MAGA should be concerned about this one…

    Half of Americans see Donald Trump as a fascist: POLL (ABC News)

    49% of registered voters in the national survey say Trump is a fascist, defined as “a political extremist who seeks to act as a dictator, disregards individual rights and threatens or uses force against their opponents.” Fewer than half as many, 22%, see Harris as a fascist by this definition…

    Perceptions of fascism are tied to partisanship: 87% of Democrats call Trump a fascist, compared with 46% of independents and 12% of Republicans. Harris, for her part, is seen as a fascist by 41% of Republicans, 20% of independents and 3% of Democrats…

    …Among registered voters who think Trump is a fascist, 8% support him anyway.

    Interviews for this survey were completed Tuesday, before The New York Times published an interview in which John Kelly, a retired general and former secretary of homeland security and Trump chief of staff, said Trump “certainly falls into the general definition of fascist, for sure.”

    …Trump also comes in for disproportionate criticism in the truth-telling department. Sixty-five percent of registered voters say he often says things that are not true. Fewer, but still 49%, say the same about Harris. Even among his own supporters, 30% say Trump often speaks untruths.

    And this survey began on 18 Oct, well before John Kelly’s latest alarm pulling? Tsk, tsk.

    6
  2. charontwo says:

    @DK:

    Among registered voters who think Trump is a fascist, 8% support him anyway.

    Even among his own supporters, 30% say Trump often speaks untruths.

    These are very much not dealbreakers for people who think Trump is the strong daddy they want caring for them.

    Is dementia a dealbreaker? Hard to say, but good luck getting a personality cult to see that as more than fake news.

    4
  3. charontwo says:

    The other problem is that not all people think fascism is bad, especially among authoritarian follower personalities.

    2
  4. Neil Hudelson says:

    Small correction, unless I’m being dense (quite possible), Harris is running 5 points worse with black men than women of that cohort (58 men, 63 women). Your larger point stands though.