Poll Hub

As 2022 winds down, Washington will see big changes as a new Congress will be seated in a few weeks – with a big difference over the current one – Republicans will control the House. What do Americans expect from this arrangement? Our poll with NPR and the PBS NewsHour indicates there's little hope for much accomplishment and Americans broadly agree on something else: our democracy is seriously threatened.

Then we welcome McClatchy's veteran Congressional reporter David Lightman to get a deeper understanding about what’s likely coming. What will the divided government Americans voted for in November do – especially with 2024 already on the horizon and a potential Trump-Biden rematch sucking up all the oxygen in the room. 

And, we’re wrapping with a seasonal Fun Fact with polls from opposite sides of the globe. Ho ho ho! Let’s go! 

The 10th anniversary of the horrific mass school shooting in Sandy Hook, Connecticut is on December 14th, 2022. The people of the town have noted prior anniversaries quietly and that’s expected again. But 10 years on, we wanted to see what – if anything – had changed: in policy, in public opinion, in the number of additional shootings.

Then, the pandemic sparked a mass early retirement party for older Americans and that could be very problematic – maybe not for them but certainly for everyone else. We’ll explain.

And, we end with...a very final end...extinction. It’s a poll question we would have never thought to ask. Intrigued?

Sure, the 2022 elections aren't even officially over yet, but with Trump already announcing his run for President in 2024, we're looking at new polling showing he may be facing a very uphill climb. Then again, Joe Biden is no more popular for 2024 so what -- or who -- do Americans want? The data suggests they may not know, but they do know who they DON'T want.

Next up, smoking is making a comeback but not exactly the way you might think. Young adults are smoking cigarettes less than ever, but they're smoking something a little more green at increasing rates. We're also looking at how smoking rates are linked to geography, education, and politics -- is it correlation, causation, or coincidence?

Finally, while we're on the topic of cigarettes, Lee's Fun Fact takes us back to 1939, when cigarettes were only one popular way to ingest tobacco.

The "Red Tsunami" was downgraded to a "Red Wave" on election night before ending up as a "Red Ripple." So, why did so many in politics and the media get it wrong? A lot are blaming "the polls" but we're explaining why that is simply not true. As we've said on Poll Hub for years, quality polls are entirely different from aggregators that average surveys from everyone -- including organizations with no track record and no transparency about their methods or funding. So...we have some advice.

Then, looking at the main issues of concern to voters in the midterms, the opioid crisis barely registered, despite killing over 100,000 Americans last year. Freelance journalist and recovering addict Zachary Siegel (@ZachWritesStuff), who also hosts Narcotica Podcast (@Narcocast) about mental health and addiction and co-writes Substance, a Substack about drugs and crime, is here to help us understand the disconnect. Zach takes us on a deep dive into why such a huge problem, that's impacting so many American families, isn't more important to voters.

We end the show with some food for thought, and everyone's got a different opinion on Lee's yummy Fun Fact this week.

We made it! Election Day is behind us and most of the votes have been counted, so, now it's time to see how WE did. Our final polls showed close races and we were on the money. We discuss how we changed how we poll in order to adapt to a changing world and how that may have made our polls more accurate. We're also sorting through the rubble of the massive number of new and/or untested polls that flooded many states late in the game. Did they change the narrative this year for better or worse?

Speaking of which, how did all those polls get rolled up and incorporated into the aggregators and forecasters that have become so popular with political pundits and reporters? This was NOT a good cycle for them and we explain why. Plus, how those arguing for the politeratti that give more weight to the early vote data were proven correct.

And, we POLISH up this week's episode with an interesting one from the halcyon bygone fifties. What item were people buying in grocery stores, five & dimes, and shoe stores? And why does Lee think about football when he hears about it?

We're diving deep into the data from our new national poll with NPR and the PBS NewsHour to spot the national trends that are shaping this election. While many results seem to favor Republicans in general, one really stands out for how big a change it is from prior years' polling -- and it could signal a stronger Democratic showing than some expect.

We've also wrapped our final battleground state polls and the results from Pennsylvania, Georgia, and Arizona are a mixed bag for both parties. There are very close senate races that will be decided by whose voters actually cast ballots on Election Day itself.

We end with a not-at-all Fun Fact from 1937 that asked voters some very pointed questions about religion and gender. Why? Because history may not repeat, but it echoes...

We've been polling key states since Labor Day and this week we released new numbers from Ohio and North Carolina. Both feature retiring GOP Senators, meaning open seats with no incumbents. Democrats are hoping to grab one or both to add to their bare-minimum majority while Republicans want to keep them in their column. Ohio shows a notable increase in the top concern of voters... what has changed since our last report? In North Carolina, the race is close as a surprising number of voters still don't have an opinion of either major candidate.

Next up, some call them smartphones, others, "adult pacifiers." We're joined by Shiri Melumad (@ShiriM528), Assistant Professor of Marketing and Wolpow Family Faculty Scholar at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania (https://marketing.wharton.upenn.edu/profile/_whrtn71/ ), who gives us an insight into the world's attachment to smartphones. Are phones bad? Good? Both? Neither? And, should we differentiate between the content we see and the actual phone itself?

Finally, a seasonal Fun Fact. We pulled up a 1960 poll to see what time of year people enjoyed the most, and, let's just say, we don't really agree with most in that survey.

We devote the episode to our conversation with Steve Thomma, who's been involved in covering the White House as a reporter since Ronald Reagan's second term and now serves as Executive Director of the White House Correspondents' Association.

Steve talks about how the relationship between the White House and the journalists assigned to cover it has seemed to worsen almost continually since the 80s. He notes the criticism of both the Trump and Biden teams and how more access to the President hasn't always meant better information.

We also talked about how reporters deal with Presidential untruths -- "lies" is a word only recently used by major American media -- and how the press has evolved to report on them. And, what about candidates and politicians refusing to talk to, or even allow into news conferences, reporters they don't like? Steve has some thoughts about that.

Then, to wrap up, we invite Steve -- a Chicagoan -- to explain how his hometown could fall so far behind NYC in a critical poll from 1955. He also explains, in minute detail, what makes a Chicago hot dog so superior to all others.

First stop, colorful Colorado. It seems like both parties are revved up for the upcoming election, with big majorities of Dems and Republicans saying they will definitely vote. What does this mean for the incumbent Democratic governor and senator?

The Lone Star State is next, and Texans on both sides are surprisingly confident in elections to be "fair and accurate" in November. Will the o'reliable red state remain red, or could Beto O'Rourke find success this time around?

And finally, New York. In such a heavily Democratic state, incumbent Democratic Governor Kathy Hochul should be a shoe-in. After all, not many states give President Biden a high approval rating, but will campaigning on crime pay off for Republican Lee Zeldin?

Our latest national poll with NPR has good news for Democrats...and Republicans with roughly four weeks to the midterms. For instance, Joe Biden's approval rating keeps trending up but Republicans are more enthusiastic to vote. And then there's this: We asked if people thought their favored candidate should concede if he/she/they lost the election. We dig into all the results.

Next, crime has been a long-time GOP campaign issue and why not? Over many decades, more voters see Republicans as better able to handle it than Democrats. But, will it work this time around or will it be trumped by other issues important to swing voters such as abortion?

And, for Lee's Fun Fact, the team discloses their own bad habits as we talk about Americans' most likely guilty pleasures engaged in when no one else is around.