[hcmama]

Last week, Fox released their swing state polls showing Trump ahead everywhere and tied...in Virginia.

This poll shows Biden with a 45% approval rating and his support surging with independents--the very people you would expect to be Trump's winning margin in the swing states

It makes no sense at all.

[Zhang Fei]

[Last week, Fox released their swing state polls showing Trump ahead everywhere and tied...in Virginia.
This poll shows Biden with a 45% approval rating and his support surging with independents—the very people you would expect to be Trump’s winning margin in the swing states

It makes no sense at all.]

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Past tendencies are no indicator of current or future results. But assuming the samples are consistent, I think we’ve persistently seen a Trump effect in polling. When Tom Bradley, LA’s mayor, ran against George Deukmejian for CA governor, the polls showed him winning with a healthy margin.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradley_effect

It was posited that some survey respondents felt embarrassed about not wanting to put Bradley, who was black, in the governor’s mansion, so indicated they would vote for Bradley even though they actually intended to vote for Deukmejian.

If such a phenomenon actually exists, something similar may be at work here. There might be people embarrassed to say they’re voting for Trump, so say they will vote for Biden. That may be how Biden polled 8 points ahead close to the 2020 election, but only won by 4.