While opinion polls are a pillar of life in the political and communications communities, every four years Americans become fixated on polls for a few short months during a presidential election year.
I hate to break the news to you, though; any political poll taken today will be biased to those on the left. The reason is that many people from the right don’t trust the media and either refuse to be involved in such a poll or, if they do participate, tell the liberal pollsters what they believe they want to hear just to screw with their findings.
And apparently, I’m not the only one who doesn’t believe polls. According to a survey at the end of 2018 by The Hill-HarrisX, most registered voters (52 percent) are doubtful about polls they hear about in the liberal news media. Twenty-nine percent of respondents said they don’t believe most polls but do trust a few, while 19 percent said they “almost never” believe that polls are accurate.
There are also those who I like to call “closet Republicans” who fear that giving their opinion will lead to being stigmatized and even harassed. Why? Because the left has made being a conservative socially unacceptable.
The risks of “coming out” as a Republican, or worse as a Trump supporter, can be severe (remember what Texas Congressman Joaquin Castro did?) As a result, many conservative-minded folks simply keep their mouths shut and stay quiet about their political views. Former President Richard Nixon frequently spoke of these people as a “silent majority” that was invisible in polls.
Our current political climate demonizes the right is one that will lead to more division AND surprise election results, just like we saw three years ago. The American “silent majority” are regular mainstream voters unwilling to be branded racists due to their support of smaller government. On election day, these same conservatives show up at the voting booth and pull the lever for Republican candidates.
So don’t believe the political polls you see that will precede the 2020 election because they’ll continue to be inaccurate. I think the fear of being ostracized and harassed has been a driving factor behind Republican voters misleading not only their friends and family but pollsters as well.
The only way the polls will be accurate is if they demoralize people enough that they don’t show up for the election, proving the lying polls reliable in the end.