There hasn’t been a poll that put a Republican presidential candidate ahead in my lifetime, at least since I was old enough to pay attention, which was Reagan ‘80.
The polls had Carter up right to the end.
The data turned on him in the last week; actually I think it was literally the weekend before the election. IIRC, it was Pat Caddell who gave him the bad news. The MSM, of course, saw nothing, heard nothing, and said nothing about that as the voting started.
During the election of 1984, the pollsters were silent, except when they gave Mondale the edge early in 1984. As the year went on, they kept mum.
Remember when Kerry ran against GWB and the exit polls had him winning in a landslide? All his minions were picking out drapes and then the REAL votes came in and they screamed and moaned that we cheated. It was almost as good as beating HRC in 2016!
The funniest poll was the Gallup poll from July 21-22, 1988 that showed Iron Mike Dukakis 17 points ahead of GHW Bush. Bush 41 ended up winning the popular vote by 7,000,000 and the electoral college 426-111 (1 faithless ‘Rat elector in WV voted for Lloyd Bentsen).
Yup. Caddell broke it to Carter on Air Force One the day before the election that he was going to lose. That did not come out until a week later, but the NY Times reported that at Carter’s last campaign appearance in Plains, Georgia, he was unaccountably teary and emotional instead of his usual steely and smiling self. Reading that on election day I felt certain that Reagan was going to win.
Newsweek cover Nov. 3, 1980. Carter and Reagan running “neck and neck.”
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