I've Noticed Something Else Very Strange Happening in This Election

Years ago when I was working as a TV News Director in Boise, ID, a pollster friend of mine called me with news of a bombshell.? A poll he conducted that had been commissioned by one of his clients showed that the incumbent Republican Congressman for Idaho’s 1st District was trailing his Democratic opponent.? Mind you, Idaho’s 1st District was then and remains one of the deepest red districts in the nation.? No one was polling that race because no one believed the Democrat could win it.? The pollster’s client decided not to release it because they probably didn’t believe it and had commissioned the poll expecting it to show the opposite.? My friend’s proposal:? He would buy it back if my newsroom would then buy it from him and use it.? It was a deal!

The blowback from our reporting on that poll was extreme.? The congressman in question was arrogant and not well liked, but enough to lose Idaho’s 1st District?? His office pushed back hard on us both privately and publicly.? Others in his party were in disbelief. It was so controversial that we were able to milk it for stories for a week as it took center stage in the news cycle. Other TV stations and newspapers had to cite our poll in their own political coverage.? Two months later (and as the poll had predicted), the incumbent congressman’s Democratic Party challenger defeated him. It was an upset, but it wasn't a surprise because of that poll.

Polling is not voting, but my point is that pollsters do them because they provide valuable insight into the state of political campaigns and what voters are thinking.? It’s more than ‘horserace’ analysis.? Polls are snapshots into the evolution of the electorate, and in the 2024 Presidential race, the polls are screaming one common theme.? They ... just ... don't ... move!

Thirty-four felony convictions?? Maybe a point for your opponent.? A historically atrocious debate performance?? Two points perhaps.? An unprecedented changing of the nominee at last moment?? Maybe a one or two point bounce.? These would all be game-changers in any other presidential race.? Not this time.

Poll after poll after poll are telling us the same thing, and that is Americans have already made up their minds.? For example, the most stunning thing to me about the latest CNN poll which shows Trump leading Harris 49% to 45% nationwide is that it indicates that 94% of people in July already know what their decision will be in November.? Put in third party candidates, and an Economist/You Gov survey found 92% of voters had already decided their vote in July (full disclosure, I was one of those polled).? A Qunnipiac poll released on Monday shows exactly the same thing.? To have that level of voter certainty more than 100 days before an election is crazy.

The Real Clear Politics website average of polls has Trump polling ahead of Harris by an average of 1.7%, only slightly less than he polled against Biden. It’s been around that margin the entire year.? That’s also highly unusual, if not unprecedented, especially in light of all the bizarre things which have happened politically in 2024.

Harris still has to pick a VP and the Democrats also have their convention coming up in August.? Harris has just started hitting the campaign trail.? There’s also always that nefarious ‘October Surprise’ factor.? She's got some momentum and anything is possible I suppose.

But polling up to now shows that a big challenge for the Harris campaign in their pitch to get so-called ‘persuadables’ is that they may find that there are not be that many voters left to persuade.