Some may recall when I questioned the recent Gallup generic ballot results with sharp language. I caught them passing off a poll of adults, with the shift toward the Democrats that usually entails, as a poll of registered voters. It got national media attention.
It’s clear to me the message was received, because now in the first release after my criticism, the poll has in just two weeks shown a remarkable 9 point swing toward the GOP.
Where in the week I complained, Democrats were ahead 48-44, projecting only a tiny Republican gain in November and continued control of the chamber by Democrats, now the poll shows Republicans ahead 48-43, which projects a much different result:
| Category | D | R |
|---|---|---|
| 2008 two party split | 56 | 44 |
| Gallup two party split July 19 | 53 | 47 |
| Gallup two party split August 2 | 47 | 53 |
It’s a complete reversal. The latest results swings the electorate from D+12 to R+6, and that net 18 point swing projects to a 51 seat Republican gain from 2008 in the Swingometer, and a 229-206 Republican majority in the House.
Now don’t try it again, Gallup. We’re watching. The Internet is funny that way.
P.S. Rasmussen has a new generic out, too. It never made a radical turn toward the Democrats, and now has Republicans up 46-38. That translates to a 55-45 two party split, a 22 point swing from 2008, and a 60 seat Republican gain.
House of Representatives Swingometer
Electoral College Swingometer
For those that don’t know (it took me a while to find), if you go to pollster.com and look at the generic ballot, they have a pretty neat feature that lets you isolate any one polling group (expanding the graph makes this a little easier). Find any data point from Gallup and click it and a dashed line will appear showing all of Gallup’s data. A few trends become apparent: 1) Gallup’s data is fairly bouncy (as many have pointed out), 2) They consistently overpredict Democrats on the generic ballot by 3% to 5% and 3) that Dem spike over the past two weeks went completely opposite to the general trend all other pollsters were seeing.
Not impressed with Gallup to say the least.
Awesome job Neil! David beats Goliath.