John Zogby: [00:00:00] when I do see a lead change, it's not only within the margin of error, it's actually just a blip
Jeremy Zogby: So to your question, what is going on? There is no momentum.
the simple answer. There is no momentum.
John Zogby: all this money that's being spent now, between, let's say October 1st and the election, so much of it is on negative advertising. And that's designed, I believe, to depress turnout.
John Zogby: It's Tuesday, October 20th, and America votes in just two weeks. And so this is a special edition of Real Polling in Real Time with Zogby.
How's Jeremy Zogby doing?
Jeremy Zogby: I'm pretty good. It's very busy. Obviously take that over the alternative. [00:01:00] How about you?
John Zogby: I'm, I'm doing really fine as opposed to somewhat fine, somewhat not fine, or not fine at all
Jeremy Zogby: and beyond very fine
John Zogby: And by-- beyond very fine. Yeah. So real polling, real time. Let's talk about polling
Jeremy Zogby: Yeah
John Zogby: just some observations. I've been daily tracking polls, in election years for many years, and I'm watching the polls very closely this time.
And there's something that really astounds me, and that is overall the lack of real movement from day to day, week to week. So I can tell you what the closest election in Amer- in American history in 2000, when Al Gore eked out a popular vote victory by about one half of 1%. through September and October, we would see the pendulum swing over [00:02:00] the course of days.
So it would head towards a three or four-point Gore, five-point Gore lead, swing back towards a Bush lead, not all at once, but over the course of days, and then ended up where it ended up. It was the same thing in 2004, 2012, two lead changes, as many as three, four or five points over a couple of days for, either candidate.
What I'm seeing here in these battleground states are numbers that are almost frozen, I would say. So you'll have, Abdul El-Sayed up by, 2.6 today. It was 2.7 last week at this time. The same thing with, any really any other state, Sherrod Brown versus John Husted in Ohio. Congresswoman Peltola up by [00:03:00] 2.3 today. it was 2.4 last week. I'm not seeing anything even close to a radical swing or any movement. In essence, when I do see a lead change, it's not only within the margin of error, it's actually just a blip on the screen.
for example, Kansas, which, is very competitive and almost tied. The Republican, Marshall has, quote, "Gone back into the lead," but by two percentage points. But the average is that Hamilton, the Democrat, is up by .3 percentage points. So I'm very curious about that lack of movement. The second thing is that, be cautious in reading the polls because all [00:04:00] of us do turnout models, right?
And we've talked about the fact that the turnout model based to some degree on science, but it's also artwork, especially when you're weighting your sample to reflect what you believe the turnout model is going to be. And if there are Republican pollsters who are assuming, or because their clients are paying, who might have the Republican doing better than the Democrat, it's because they've weighted, to a great degree, weighted more in favor of Republican turnout than Democratic turnout, and look, vice versa as well.
And so the wise consumer and the wise voter should first of all not look and, ask, "Why is ahead by three in one poll and the other guy ahead by two in a different [00:05:00] poll?" But actually, what's the trend line? Is there a trend line or is this just too close to call? So that's to alert... I'm not suggesting when we look at the turnout model that there's anything sinister at all.
What I am suggesting is l-look at the pollster's, experience and, career track, but also look at, what their party representation is in their turnout model, as well as any other demographics that they might be missing. But why are there no big swings this year? What do you think?
Jeremy Zogby: That's a great question. And To tackle that question head on, want to say that... let's go, let's contrast, let's go back to 2024, [00:06:00] albeit a presidential election, but a great example of When Joe Biden stepped off the scene and Kamala Harris stepped onto the scene, it was about mid-July, and by that point, Kamala shot up in the polls. Don't quote me to the exact percentage, but a lot of polls were showing her ahead by five, six, seven percentage points. I think that's, pretty fair to say. And that carried through July, and that carried through August, and it was the Kamala Harris high. there was an emotional high from the Democrats because they were very concerned following Joe Biden's, debate performance in late June, then that whole two, three-week period was chaos. and then Harris arrives on the scene, there was this high. You go through September, Harris is still in [00:07:00] the lead in a lot of polls, ahead by three, four, five percentage points. Then when you got to the month of October, and I remember being on, the Power Hour, that's, in, in Australia, and they were asking me, "What about the polls?
shouldn't we look at the Polymarket? the Polymarket is, probably a better indicator." I said, "Pull up both charts. Pull up the RealClearPolitics average and pull up Polymarket." And they did. A live-- on live TV, they pulled it up, and you could see the same story. In Polymarket, once you crossed October, when I was doing that interview, that was late October, that was about a week before the election. Polymarket, the odds showed, Harris going down, a, a pretty steep line going down. The RealClearPolitics, not as dramatic as, [00:08:00] betting market odds, but in a similar fashion, looking at the, the trend line or the line graph, you saw the polls narrowing once you crossed into October, Harris coming down, Trump, narrowing the lead, all of which was to indicate that there was momentum.
So to your question, what is going on? There is no momentum.
the simple answer. There is no momentum. So what does that mean? and, you and I have been saying this and, shouting this, and I think we're one of the, one of the few voices out there, saying, "Hold your horses. We don't know yet."
And I'm in a much better position to say this now because of your point about the polls aren't moving, and my interpretation is that because the polls are not moving- not really sure that there is so much momentum in these battleground [00:09:00] races, especially as we look here, Real Clear Politics, you've already done this, but whether it's Michigan, whether it's Texas, whether it's Ohio, whether it's Iowa, whether it's Alaska, whether it's Maine, there's no movement, which means there's no momentum, and there's still two weeks left. We do not have a bona fide October surprise. I don't know what it is going to be. I'm not 100% sure we're going to get one because you don't always get one. I'm fairly s-- fairly confident we will, but there's no guarantee, and it could be anything. It could be anything related to the war with Iran. It could be anything related to the AI bubble, a lot of those stocks, they are-- the Magnificent Seven are forty percent of the market, and a lot of these companies are down twenty percent. it could be that. It could be Look at what's going on in France. Look what's going on in Spain.
Look what's going [00:10:00] on in Portugal, in Italy. People are taking to the streets. The Republicans wanna say that it's, communism and left-wingism and, Islamism, when in all actuality, the reality is, that the war in Iran had created a, just a ripple effect in the bond market, which is putting pressure on national governments, regional governments, local governments, and people are starting to feel the pain.
So you could see something similar, perhaps. But the fact of the matter is, it's not a done deal yet, and with two weeks to go, so much going on in the country and in the world, anything can be happen. Anything can happen. So last point that I'll make is the rush to, predict so certainly what's gonna happen? Why not just solace in the fact that there's two weeks to go, [00:11:00] pretty, pretty likely something deci-decisive will happen that will move the needle, that will move, who could be on the fence towards greater certainty?
John Zogby: I get that. That could very well happen. I've got an alternative, point of view, and that is all this money that's being spent now, between, let's say October 1st and the election, so much of it is on negative advertising. And that's designed, I believe, to depress turnout. My assumption being that, look, if my candidate hasn't persuaded you by now, then you're probably not gonna vote for my candidate.
I'm gonna make damn sure you're not gonna vote for the other candidate and dredge up whatever can possibly be dredged up. A lot of that being done by dark money, which is a whole other issue that we should tackle [00:12:00] one of these days. But the point being that a lot of money, being spent not to increase turnout, but to depress the turnout.
Okay, both candidates are not worthy of your vote. And so if we're frozen in time, then we hope that at the last minute, either Republican-leaning voters are going to say, "Look, it was no picnic the last time the Democrats were around, and Joe Biden lied to us about his health." And the Democrats are gonna say what-- which they are saying, "Look at the mess we're in on a number of fronts, and look at the demeanor of this president.
Can we afford another four years of that?" It all depends how people feel probably in the last couple of days
Jeremy Zogby: that's about all I have.
John Zogby: That's about all I have. yeah, that's it. We ought to talk about dark money though, the next time around.
All right. Have a good week
Jeremy Zogby: You too
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