For anyone with a young person in their lives, please encourage them to:
* Check their registration ASAP - some of the social media sites claiming to help people register may be sending people to fake sites!! (I know it happened in 2020). I recommend using one of the following: www.vote.org, www.vote411.org, or iwillvote.com. (The first 2 are non-partisan, the third is sponsored by the Democratic Party). Vote411.org has a Spanish version too! (www.vote411.org/es).
- Make sure you are listed as being an active voter
- confirm you are registered at the correct address.
* Make a plan to vote!
- You can look up voting rules for your state here: https://www.vote411.org/voting-rules (click on your state name in 1st column for more details).
I'm not sure they are even capturing us old farts. Even when I had a land line, I never got a call from a pollster. And now, NADA. Maybe they are polling the same folks over and over.
Harris's joy is helping to drive younger voters to sign up to vote and to volunteer for her campaign. Elections are won by the candidate who expresses optimism of the future NOT doom and gloom. Kamala is a refreshing joyful warrior that's talking about a better future for the nation. Trump's boring old act of whinning and complaining has worn out the majority of voters and people are REJECTING his negativity.
Can't wait to vote for our FIRST woman president and celebrate wearing this "We the People means EVERYONE" shirt on November 5th 👇
Another constituent are teenagers who are too young to vote but could influence their parents. Especially girls. "Too Young To Vote? How To Remind Your #GirlDad To Vote With Your Future In Mind!"
It's not just the youth vote. We have broad sample polls of both the Black and Hispanic votes to complete the three Democratic affinity groups down on Biden in the Spring. Their margins:
Your average poll lately has had Black voter splits not too far off of Howard, but Hispanic voter splits way, way off of Unidos. QPac managed to find Trump winning Hispanic voters 44-52 (and it found him winning White voters 46-50, making a tie mathematically impossible AFAIK - QPac's poll was garbage). Most polls have Trump in the 38-42 range with Hispanic voters, 10-15 points higher than he may end up. As has been discussed here and elsewhere, the big driver of this is polling disproportionately (or in QPac's case exclusively) in English.
Here's the thing. In 2020, the electorate was 67% White and 13% Black and Hispanic each. Many polls fail to even match this in their weighting (NYT typically has 10% for the minority categories, CBS/YouGov has an indefensible 72% White share...) but THIS IS NOT STATIC. The White share of the electorate has declined by 2-4% every election since 2000. If you extrapolate the linear trend on these categories, you get 64.2%W/13.8%B/14.5%H for 2024.
Trump won White voters 41-58 in 2020 and lost by 4.7. If Harris is on track to match or exceed Biden with 18-29s and Black and Hispanic voters (and she is according to the broad surveys of each), Trump must do better than 41-58 with White voters to lose by less, much less win. I've been reading crosstabs on polls since March, and I've never even seen him match that margin, much less exceed it. If Harris gains on Biden AT ALL with White voters (read: White suburban women, Dobbs Dads, Haley Republicans) the margins of victory for Harris get big pretty quickly.
Yes, I concur, and believe that earlier NYT polls at least missed a lot of the Latino vote because they didn’t bother with Spanish-speaking households. Univision polls showed that these households broke strongly (back then) for Biden, meaning the Times simply had skewed data by excluding these voters.
It’s always better to go with larger sample, group specific studies whose results have lined up with actual votes historically.
Univision actually has their own poll with Trump at 38%, but it was collected entirely in the first week of August, so I went with the Unidos one here (not just because it was better for Harris). They actually found a near-tie among Hispanic voters in July, suggesting that there is elasticity that doesn't exist in other groups, and that Harris is moving the right direction (and again, Unidos was in the field prior to the debate).
This is pretty fantastic. I've been mostly concerned about their general frustration with fundamental issues within the two party system. Enough of them are realizing that in order to fix that, we need to stop fighting this bad guy and put the Trump case to rest once and for all. Those who may be opposed to some of Kamala Harris' policies will have their voices heard after she wins.
Those who are opposed to Trump's policies, such as they are, will end up with serial numbers on their arms or a criminal court docket or both.
All of this is good news. HOWEVER, we don't win by watching the polls. We win when we fight like we are behind and make sure everyone votes...and every vote is counted.
My understanding is that pollsters only call from a list that contains the names of those who have previously voted. If so, none of the polls are capturing the new registrations. Among the young at least, those are breaking heavily for Harris, giving us another reason to believe all these poll results are sus.
Fantastic analysis Jay—thank you! And isn’t it also true none of these surveys catch first time voters, or have a difficult time with factoring them in?
Due to electoral votes being where stats really matter, this is useless. I love Jay Kuo but if (let’s say) all the youths polled live in California, New York, etc., it doesn’t matter for the presidential election. What we need to see is stats broken down state by state or even within-individual-swing-states. How are “the youth” voting in Nevada/Arizona/North Carolina/etc? And what’s the GOTV action therein?
I am very uneasy about the electorate count myself. IQ45 seems very comfortable not campaigning hard, my hope is it truly hurts him but my gut is torn up over this.
Nice to have a feel good poll. The important point is to use the poll to create the next stage in the messaging strategy. If white men can be reached, the Harris campaign needs to act. Big group. A few points would matter. Also, positive events that get coverage over the next 6 weeks are essential. They have done well up yo now. But the recency effect is huge in elections.
There's another unmentioned demographic that's likely to be even more important, since they constitute 33% of voters, as compared to the 16% Gen Z delivers.
That's those "women over 50" - most particularly women over 65 - that professional dumbfuck Bernie Moreno can't understand why they are concerned about abortion. Moreno must not know any women over 50 who have daughters, granddaughters, nieces, grand-nieces, cousins, daughters of friends, students, patients, clients, who are "women under 50" that they worry about. He must also be unaware (I mean, he is a Republican, so the fact he can distinguish day from night is an accomplishment) that "Women over 65" are the generation who fought for the rights the MAGAts have taken away, and the other rights they want to take away.
The one good thing about fighting the Right - from Hitler to Trump - is that they are ALL worthless morons.
Let me break it down a bit further for the average Blue Collar voter :
The endless slashing of education budgets by the gop is really paying off, they can't win on platform or anything else but fear of some unknown boogy man .
Edcated voters for the most part would never support anyone like these two .
Restricting / denying their right to vote is also one of the most important activities of the so-called "aw & order" party .
This new poll allows me to have very cautious optimism .
I have suspected (and hoped) that the mainstream polls are not capturing the youth perspective. Great post! Thank you
For anyone with a young person in their lives, please encourage them to:
* Check their registration ASAP - some of the social media sites claiming to help people register may be sending people to fake sites!! (I know it happened in 2020). I recommend using one of the following: www.vote.org, www.vote411.org, or iwillvote.com. (The first 2 are non-partisan, the third is sponsored by the Democratic Party). Vote411.org has a Spanish version too! (www.vote411.org/es).
- Make sure you are listed as being an active voter
- confirm you are registered at the correct address.
* Make a plan to vote!
- You can look up voting rules for your state here: https://www.vote411.org/voting-rules (click on your state name in 1st column for more details).
- You can check on voter ID requirements iin your state here: www.voteriders.org/staterules/
- research your ballot so that you are prepared to vote up ⬆️ and down ⬇️ the ballot for every race and ballot initiative:
➡️www.vote411.org/ballot
➡️https://guides.vote/
➡️https://bluevoterguide.org/
➡️also check online with Board of Elections or Secretary of State's office for an official voter guide
* Vote Early if feasible
- it takes you off the GOTV call and canvass lists
- it reduces wasted effort by volunteers trying to get out the vote (GOTV) so that they can concentrate on lower propensity voters
- it creates a social pressure campaign (FOMO) on others to vote when they hear how many people are voting
- it reduces wait times on election day by "front loading" voters during early voting period
Don’t forget this address www.vote.gov as well.
I'm not sure they are even capturing us old farts. Even when I had a land line, I never got a call from a pollster. And now, NADA. Maybe they are polling the same folks over and over.
Exciting news! Young people get it. It’s their future on the line and they will speak!
Yes!
Harris's joy is helping to drive younger voters to sign up to vote and to volunteer for her campaign. Elections are won by the candidate who expresses optimism of the future NOT doom and gloom. Kamala is a refreshing joyful warrior that's talking about a better future for the nation. Trump's boring old act of whinning and complaining has worn out the majority of voters and people are REJECTING his negativity.
Can't wait to vote for our FIRST woman president and celebrate wearing this "We the People means EVERYONE" shirt on November 5th 👇
https://libtees-2.creator-spring.com/listing/wtpmelb
It’s going to be glorious! Everyone will be celebrating in the streets!
Another constituent are teenagers who are too young to vote but could influence their parents. Especially girls. "Too Young To Vote? How To Remind Your #GirlDad To Vote With Your Future In Mind!"
https://thedemlabs.org/2024/09/21/too-young-to-vote-how-to-remind-your-girldad-to-vote-with-your-future-in-mind/
It's not just the youth vote. We have broad sample polls of both the Black and Hispanic votes to complete the three Democratic affinity groups down on Biden in the Spring. Their margins:
- Howard University Black Voters Battleground Poll: 85-10 Harris-Trump in a population that reported going 81-9 for Biden (personally) in 2020. 2020 exit poll was 87-12. https://gs.howard.edu/sites/gs.howard.edu/files/2024-09/Black_BG_Voters_Poll_Report_9_20_24_09282024.pdf
- UnidosUS Pre-Election Poll of the Hispanic Electorate: 58.5-32.4 with just the candidates, 59.0-29.9 when they include the running mates (that was clever). 2020 exit poll was 65-32. Note that like the Harvard survey, this was taken entirely in August, prior to the debate. https://unidosus.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Natl-deck-UnidosUS-2024-Pre-Election-Poll-of-Hispanic-Electorate.pdf
Your average poll lately has had Black voter splits not too far off of Howard, but Hispanic voter splits way, way off of Unidos. QPac managed to find Trump winning Hispanic voters 44-52 (and it found him winning White voters 46-50, making a tie mathematically impossible AFAIK - QPac's poll was garbage). Most polls have Trump in the 38-42 range with Hispanic voters, 10-15 points higher than he may end up. As has been discussed here and elsewhere, the big driver of this is polling disproportionately (or in QPac's case exclusively) in English.
Here's the thing. In 2020, the electorate was 67% White and 13% Black and Hispanic each. Many polls fail to even match this in their weighting (NYT typically has 10% for the minority categories, CBS/YouGov has an indefensible 72% White share...) but THIS IS NOT STATIC. The White share of the electorate has declined by 2-4% every election since 2000. If you extrapolate the linear trend on these categories, you get 64.2%W/13.8%B/14.5%H for 2024.
Trump won White voters 41-58 in 2020 and lost by 4.7. If Harris is on track to match or exceed Biden with 18-29s and Black and Hispanic voters (and she is according to the broad surveys of each), Trump must do better than 41-58 with White voters to lose by less, much less win. I've been reading crosstabs on polls since March, and I've never even seen him match that margin, much less exceed it. If Harris gains on Biden AT ALL with White voters (read: White suburban women, Dobbs Dads, Haley Republicans) the margins of victory for Harris get big pretty quickly.
Yes, I concur, and believe that earlier NYT polls at least missed a lot of the Latino vote because they didn’t bother with Spanish-speaking households. Univision polls showed that these households broke strongly (back then) for Biden, meaning the Times simply had skewed data by excluding these voters.
It’s always better to go with larger sample, group specific studies whose results have lined up with actual votes historically.
Univision actually has their own poll with Trump at 38%, but it was collected entirely in the first week of August, so I went with the Unidos one here (not just because it was better for Harris). They actually found a near-tie among Hispanic voters in July, suggesting that there is elasticity that doesn't exist in other groups, and that Harris is moving the right direction (and again, Unidos was in the field prior to the debate).
Young voters are the future, they know that and they will deliver. Vote as early as possible and thank you!
When I lived in Chicago we used to say, "Vote early and vote often," but I guess that is out of fashion these days. :-)
I always think of that whenever I hear “Vote early”! Hahaha
This is pretty fantastic. I've been mostly concerned about their general frustration with fundamental issues within the two party system. Enough of them are realizing that in order to fix that, we need to stop fighting this bad guy and put the Trump case to rest once and for all. Those who may be opposed to some of Kamala Harris' policies will have their voices heard after she wins.
Those who are opposed to Trump's policies, such as they are, will end up with serial numbers on their arms or a criminal court docket or both.
I feel like Trump's comment about "serial numbers" should have had a LOT more media coverage.
It barely registered in the mainstream press. Unbelievable.
Completely flabbergasted that statement wasn’t really reported by corporate media, even knowing how bad the media is these days.
What comment was that. I didn't hear that one
https://newrepublic.com/post/186239/donald-trump-full-holocaust-immigration
All of this is good news. HOWEVER, we don't win by watching the polls. We win when we fight like we are behind and make sure everyone votes...and every vote is counted.
We can't take anything for granted!
My understanding is that pollsters only call from a list that contains the names of those who have previously voted. If so, none of the polls are capturing the new registrations. Among the young at least, those are breaking heavily for Harris, giving us another reason to believe all these poll results are sus.
The new registration miss is a thing, for sure.
Fantastic analysis Jay—thank you! And isn’t it also true none of these surveys catch first time voters, or have a difficult time with factoring them in?
Indeed, it is true.
"One of the best predictors of voter behavior is how they actually voted in the recent past, ..."
Yes, but this election is like none other from the past. One could argue that we've had 248 years of Presidential elections and then we have this one.
Today's 18-30 have real-time major rights to preserve and life or death issues to resolve unlike any in our lifetimes during this electoral season.
Once the polling catches up to the incoming youngsters, we'll see the numbers more reflective of our current expectations.
There's no doubt in my mind that today's youth can swing this election.
"Let's go Swifties!" (Clap, Clap, clap-clap-clap.)
Due to electoral votes being where stats really matter, this is useless. I love Jay Kuo but if (let’s say) all the youths polled live in California, New York, etc., it doesn’t matter for the presidential election. What we need to see is stats broken down state by state or even within-individual-swing-states. How are “the youth” voting in Nevada/Arizona/North Carolina/etc? And what’s the GOTV action therein?
Thanks
I am very uneasy about the electorate count myself. IQ45 seems very comfortable not campaigning hard, my hope is it truly hurts him but my gut is torn up over this.
He doesn’t need to campaign - he’s got Elon Musk’s PAC dumping millions of dollars into swing states, doing his job for him.
I, like others, came to offer up this same point.
I read off some of the numbers to my wife and she, of course, asked where these youngsters vote.
Nice to have a feel good poll. The important point is to use the poll to create the next stage in the messaging strategy. If white men can be reached, the Harris campaign needs to act. Big group. A few points would matter. Also, positive events that get coverage over the next 6 weeks are essential. They have done well up yo now. But the recency effect is huge in elections.
“If white men can be reached…”
My gratitude to the enlightened, good-hearted white men who are reading my admittedly cynical reply.
Ha, you should read the Substack I posted today, lol.
I certainly will. Writing postcards as soon as I hit “post.” Great to hear from you!
Yay! Postcards! :-)
Good to hear this. Thanks Jay for reporting on this.
There's another unmentioned demographic that's likely to be even more important, since they constitute 33% of voters, as compared to the 16% Gen Z delivers.
That's those "women over 50" - most particularly women over 65 - that professional dumbfuck Bernie Moreno can't understand why they are concerned about abortion. Moreno must not know any women over 50 who have daughters, granddaughters, nieces, grand-nieces, cousins, daughters of friends, students, patients, clients, who are "women under 50" that they worry about. He must also be unaware (I mean, he is a Republican, so the fact he can distinguish day from night is an accomplishment) that "Women over 65" are the generation who fought for the rights the MAGAts have taken away, and the other rights they want to take away.
The one good thing about fighting the Right - from Hitler to Trump - is that they are ALL worthless morons.
Let me break it down a bit further for the average Blue Collar voter :
The endless slashing of education budgets by the gop is really paying off, they can't win on platform or anything else but fear of some unknown boogy man .
Edcated voters for the most part would never support anyone like these two .
Restricting / denying their right to vote is also one of the most important activities of the so-called "aw & order" party .
This new poll allows me to have very cautious optimism .
-Nate
Thanks for this Jay.
I suspected this was happening but it’s better to have actual data rather than just a gut feeling!