Will The General Election Look Anything Like The Polls Indicate
With numerous months separating today's world from Election Day 2020, polls have already been comparing possible democratic nominees with incumbent Donald Trump. How accurate is this practice of polling the American electorate over a hundred days out from the actual election. Or rather, what is the benefit of knowing the current leanings of American voters. Certainly the polling results now will likely look nothing at all like the results of the actual election as demonstrated by these case studies. In March of 2016, polls compiled by RealClearPolitics found the lead Hillary Clinton had over Trump never fell below 6% and she averaged a lead of about 10.4%. Obviously this lead is far different from the final result, which Clinton won the popular vote by 2.1%. In March of 2012, polls compiled by RealClearPolitics found the lead Barrack Obama had over Mitt Romney averaged 5%, fairly close to the final result of 3.9%, although the polling average in November of 2012 was a 0.7%
