Donald Trump Campaign Bashes Polling as Numbers Against Them in Final Days

With Election Day a few days away, Donald Trump’s campaign criticized recent polling on Sunday as numbers shown in the polls are against the former president.
The Des Moines Register on Saturday published the results of its final poll, finding that Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, took a three-point lead with 47 percent of likely voters saying they would choose her if the election were held today. Forty-four percent of voters said they would choose Trump, the Republican nominee.
This still falls within the poll’s margin of error, which is plus or minus 3.4 percent. The Selzer & Co. survey included 808 likely Iowa voters, who had either already cast their ballot or said they would definitely vote.
Meanwhile, according to the final Sienna College/New York Times poll, Trump is leading Harris in just one swing state.
The result, released on Sunday, shows Harris leading in Nevada, North Carolina, Wisconsin, and Georgia. The candidates are tied in Pennsylvania and Michigan, while Trump leads in Arizona.
It surveyed 7,878 likely voters across the seven states between October 24 and November 2, with a margin of error of +/- 3.5 points within each state.
Since the last round of NYT/Sienna polling in the battleground states, momentum appears to have moved towards Harris in Nevada, Georgia, and North Carolina, three states where Trump was maintaining a slim margin.
In response to these polls, Trump’s campaign released a memo on Sunday criticizing the polls stating that the data is being used to “diminish voter enthusiasm.”
“On Saturday, top Democrats appear to have received early access to an absurd outlier poll of Iowa conducted by the Des Moines Register. Not to be outdone, the New York Times arrived right on cue with another set of polling data being used to drive a voter suppression narrative against President Trump’s supporters. Some in the media are choosing to amplify a mad dash to dampen and diminish voter enthusiasm. It has not worked. Our voters are like President Trump: they fight,” the Trump campaign wrote.
Newsweek has reached out to Trump and Harris’ campaign via email for comment.
The Trump campaign continued by stating that “The New York Times is polling an electorate that looks far to the left of 2020, despite hard facts of voter registration and early voting indicate a current electorate that has shifted only to the right in every state.”
However, commenting on the responses to Newsweek, Ann Selzer, president of Pollster Selzer & Company, the firm that conducted the Iowa poll said, “These are the kinds of comments seen for virtually any poll, including mine. The Des Moines Register includes a methodology statement with each story they publish. It’s the same methodology used to show Trump winning Iowa in the final polls in 2016 and 2020. It would not be in my best interest, or that of my clients—The Des Moines Register and Mediacom—to conjure fake numbers.”
The former president won the state in the previous two elections, growing his lead from 51.15 percent in 2016 to 53.09 percent in 2020. The state voted twice for Barack Obama, and it voted for George W. Bush going into his second term after backing Al Gore in the 2000 election.
Meanwhile, Sienna College/New York Times is one of America’s most trusted pollsters. Aggregator FiveThirtyEight ranks it first on its list of 282 for its historical track record and transparency. Analyst Nate Silver ranks it in the top two firms, giving it an A+ grade.
This comes as the presidential race remains extremely tight, with the outcome largely depending on swing states, as both candidates continue campaigning across the country.
As of Sunday, according to 538’s poll tracker, Harris is ahead of Trump by 1 point — 47.9 percent to his 46.9 percent.