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Who's Really Dodging Polls? A GOP Pollster Has the Data

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WEBVTT 00:00:01.760 --> 00:00:14.480 Geez, if the conversation that the independents are having around the kitchen table is the exact same conversation as the conversation the Democrats are having around the kitchen table, like what does that tell us about, you know, what direction those those voters are gonna break? 00:00:14.800 --> 00:00:22.800 Yeah, equality matters, and I agree with you that I don't think it matters so much MAGA Republican or traditional Republican. 00:00:22.960 --> 00:00:33.679 I think Texas Republicans are sprinting to their first defeat in nearly 30 years. 00:00:33.840 --> 00:00:42.560 Not since 1994, as a Republican Democrat won a statewide race race in Texas, and several Democrats are poised to do just that in two weeks. 00:00:42.799 --> 00:00:45.200 But there's still a lot of election left going. 00:00:45.520 --> 00:00:48.799 Early voting has started, so who knows what's going to happen. 00:00:48.960 --> 00:01:13.040 We're gonna talk today with Nick Weinstein over at the at Signal, which is a big Republican polling firm, kind of talking about how polling works, the mistakes the industry has made over the past 10, 15 years, and how they are they're trying to fix it, and then what like a polling organization like his, which works for candidates and whose whole reputation is based on being right and accurate, can really do to help candidates win. 00:01:13.280 --> 00:01:32.879 Going to be also talking about Governor Abbott talking a reporter who was gluten-free into chugging a shiner beer and also getting into some really into the weeds on some dark arts that stuff that's happening in Texas politics with a pro-trans group that's mailing stuff to people, but really they've said they're not doing it. 00:01:33.040 --> 00:01:37.680 We're talking about the dark arts and why people are getting that mail this week. 00:01:37.840 --> 00:01:40.159 All that, so much more on this week's seeing red. 00:01:43.519 --> 00:01:52.560 Early voting's upon us here in Texas, and a lot of people, a lot of a lot has been in the news over the past year and will always be in the political news about polling. 00:01:52.799 --> 00:02:04.159 So I want to talk to one of the best pollsters in the business, Nick Weinstein from Signal, based in DC, and talk to him a little bit about like what what to look for when you're looking at polls. 00:02:04.319 --> 00:02:06.480 And so, Nick, welcome to Seeing Red. 00:02:06.560 --> 00:02:07.840 Thanks for joining us today. 00:02:08.159 --> 00:02:09.199 Yeah, it's my pleasure. 00:02:09.280 --> 00:02:14.400 It's a busy time up here in DC as we're you know closing in on election day here in the middle of October. 00:02:14.639 --> 00:02:20.319 So I I can only imagine what just let's just jump right into kind of the basics of polling. 00:02:21.280 --> 00:02:32.560 How like what are the ways that you and your firm and the other reputable firms do to make sure that your polling is as accurate as it can be? 00:02:33.039 --> 00:02:35.280 Yeah, I mean, that's the challenge, right? 00:02:35.439 --> 00:02:43.280 And especially as we look back to 2016, it feels like that was a moment where the public lost a lot of trust in polling, right? 00:02:43.360 --> 00:02:50.479 Because a lot of the more public pollsters, you know, they missed pretty badly, and it was sort of a reckoning for the industry. 00:02:50.639 --> 00:02:56.400 And the signal's origins come from sort of that reckoning over polling. 00:02:56.639 --> 00:03:12.159 And at the time, a lot of polling firms, even the reputable ones, were still really reliant on landline polling, calling people, having people pick up the phone, even calling people still at their landlines, which I mean, who has a landline these days? 00:03:12.400 --> 00:03:14.560 So, you know, we've had to adapt. 00:03:14.719 --> 00:03:26.000 We've we're one of the leaders in multi-mode polling, which is where we use both digital collection as well as more traditional telephone collection to try to get a sample that actually represents the electorate. 00:03:26.159 --> 00:03:37.280 Because I don't know about you, I'm certainly not picking up the phone for a random phone number in the middle of the workday and having, you know, a 20-minute conversation about you know my opinions on issue A, B, C, D. 00:03:37.360 --> 00:03:41.680 But if you send me a text message, maybe when I've got a minute after work, I'll take that survey. 00:03:41.759 --> 00:03:54.000 And that's kind of the basis of the way that we've approached this, is we've embraced multi-boat and have had a lot of great success with that as sort of the base of our collection of data since 2017. 00:03:54.479 --> 00:03:54.960 Gotcha. 00:03:55.039 --> 00:03:57.120 So like let's take it even further back. 00:03:57.199 --> 00:04:01.599 Like, why does it necessary to have like why can't you just call everyone who has a landline? 00:04:02.000 --> 00:04:05.360 Like, why would that make a poll like not very accurate? 00:04:05.759 --> 00:04:16.079 Yeah, because I mean, uh, and this is one of the challenges and why we have like a big team here at Signal that analyzes the data is because not every Republican is the same, right? 00:04:16.240 --> 00:04:18.240 And not every Democrat is the same. 00:04:18.399 --> 00:04:26.160 I mean, things like age, race, gender, education, those are really important factors. 00:04:26.240 --> 00:04:39.839 And when you think about who still has a landline in uh the year 2026, it's probably older voters, potentially even more affluent voters, people that actually own a home and have just had the landline year over year. 00:04:40.000 --> 00:04:42.959 And those are not representative of the electorate more globally. 00:04:43.040 --> 00:04:56.879 So one of the things that our team's doing on the back end of every single poll that we do is they're trying to make sure that the folks that we're collecting, the data that we're collecting, is actually reflective of the electorate more
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globally. 00:04:56.959 --> 00:05:09.600 Because if you've got, you know, a bunch of you know, highly educated, highly affluent, you know, elderly folks that are the only ones that are taking your survey because you're only calling, you know, landline phones, it's gonna miss people in the middle. 00:05:09.839 --> 00:05:13.759 It's gonna miss younger people whose attitudes about a whole host of issues are just really different. 00:05:14.000 --> 00:05:17.120 I mean, that's where survey design is so important. 00:05:18.079 --> 00:05:32.000 So let's let's talk a little bit about what the how that how that impacts like the kind of horse race polling you see from, you know, we'll start seeing like the the day after the election for presidential. 00:05:32.319 --> 00:05:32.639 Yeah. 00:05:32.959 --> 00:05:33.360 Right. 00:05:33.600 --> 00:05:51.279 And so how do pollsters know that they're like test themselves if it's not like just the week before an election they're gonna get a full population result on you know the next Tuesday, right? 00:05:51.439 --> 00:06:00.720 How do we know that the polling we saw in July was actually reflective of what the electorate was like in July if there's a major change between now and then? 00:06:01.759 --> 00:06:08.399 Yeah, I mean, so we're always trying to test our biases at Signal and to make sure that we're not missing something. 00:06:08.560 --> 00:06:25.439 Our president and CEO Brent uh Buchanan posted on X earlier today an interesting analysis of some of our more recent polls, and because there's been a discourse online about, you know, is there some sort of response bias and you know, are like Republicans avoiding polls and not taking the polls? 00:06:25.600 --> 00:06:33.279 And so we actually went back and looked, and we can look at who is not responding to surveys and to see if there's a merit to that argument. 00:06:33.519 --> 00:06:46.000 And the fact is that uh private pollsters like us that are hired for our accuracy, you know, we have to do that each and every day because if we miss on a race for a client, you know, that's a reputation that is really hard to shake. 00:06:46.079 --> 00:06:59.759 And I think if we're thinking about, you know, as your average person that's looking at polls, I think one thing we've got to think about is just, you know, comparing, you know, a poll conducted by Signal to a poll conducted by Gallup to a poll conducted by Mares is sort of like comparing apples and oranges, right? 00:06:59.839 --> 00:07:01.759 Because each pollster's methodology is different. 00:07:01.920 --> 00:07:05.360 Each pollster's outlook on what the electorate should look like is different. 00:07:05.519 --> 00:07:08.240 So I think sometimes people kind of get in this mindset. 00:07:08.319 --> 00:07:21.040 They like compare, you know, one poll to another poll conducted by different firms using different methodology, and that's useful directionally, but that's not the best way to be kind of like utilizing polls and looking at polls as we had towards November. 00:07:21.519 --> 00:07:37.360 Well, let's drill down on that because one of the most common measures people look at now beyond the actual individual polls are both the RCP average or other aggregate averages, and then the what are they called, the the Calci and uh uh polymarkets of the world, though. 00:07:37.600 --> 00:07:49.120 But on the RCP with this the real clear politics average, poll average, like is is that any more valuable or is it less valuable because there's so much more air thrown into it? 00:07:49.439 --> 00:07:51.920 Well, there's some noise in there with that RCP average. 00:07:52.000 --> 00:07:56.879 And look, it's it's a it's a good way to get a quick snapshot of what the race looks like. 00:07:57.040 --> 00:08:08.000 But you've got to think about, you know, if a poll was conducted in the middle of August, is that included in the RCP average with the same weight as a poll that's conducted in the middle of October? 00:08:08.160 --> 00:08:13.519 And should we, you know, look at those polls as you know equally reflective of where the election actually is? 00:08:13.600 --> 00:08:31.040 And I think it's really useful, you know, you go into that RCP average and you look at that trend line because it's going to show you each and every poll, and then you can see like, you know, well, Mayers was in the field in the middle of July, and then they were in the field again in the middle of September, and then they were in the field in the middle of October, and like this is the trend line with this pollster, and this is the trend line with that pollster. 00:08:31.199 --> 00:08:32.080 So it's useful. 00:08:32.240 --> 00:08:43.919 And I mean, prediction markets to me are just kind of downstream of the polling in that it's people looking at all the polling and then kind of doing their own analysis of the polling to try to make an informed bet on the direction that the race is going to go. 00:08:44.000 --> 00:08:50.799 So there's value in looking at the prediction markets too, but it's it's an art as much as it is as it is a science. 00:08:50.879 --> 00:09:09.039 And I think sometimes people get you know laser focused on the difference between one poll and another poll without kind of digging beneath the surface of those top line numbers and understanding, you know, the difference between those two polls could be easily explained just by the retro ballot and one poll being a point or two different than the retro ballot in the other poll. 00:09:09.440 --> 00:09:09.840 Gotcha. 00:09:10.000 --> 00:09:14.159 And the retro ballot being the what the ballot looked like in 2024. 00:09:14.639 --> 00:09:14.879 Yeah. 00:09:15.039 --> 00:09:20.960 And you see a lot of public polls that don't even ask a 2024 retro ballot, and that should be like a major red flag. 00:09:21.039 --> 00:09:37.600 If you're looking at a poll and when you go in the crosstats, you can't see what the electorate looked like
during the last presidential election or the last midterm election, major red flag because it's really, really hard to control for environmental effects if you don't know what the environment looked like at the most recent election. 00:09:37.840 --> 00:09:39.679 So yeah, fair enough. 00:09:40.000 --> 00:09:47.519 So let's just kind of drill into like a little bit on there, which is to say, like, what is a crosstab? 00:09:47.679 --> 00:09:52.240 But then beyond that, you've made a couple comments about the the different types of polling. 00:09:52.480 --> 00:09:58.799 So you said there's private polling and there's you know public polling and then there's partisan public public polling. 00:09:59.360 --> 00:10:10.000 Kind of talk a little bit about those things and then talk talk about the different types of like uh firms out there and what what kind of polls they're they're putting out. 00:10:10.320 --> 00:10:16.159 Yeah, so crosstabs are you know, your so your top line is the the number, right? 00:10:16.240 --> 00:10:24.559 So if we ask, you know, who are you gonna vote for Canada Day or candidate B, the top line is you know, 50% for Canada Day, 50% for candidate B, 0% undecided. 00:10:24.639 --> 00:10:32.720 And the crosstabs are when we look below that top line and we'll ask, you know, a series of demographic questions as a part of the poll. 00:10:32.879 --> 00:10:56.639 So stuff like male, female economic indicators, you know, like you know, income, race, geography, and those are the things that you look at underneath the poll, and it'll say, you know, candidate A is the Republican, so they're getting 60% of men, and candidate B is the Democrat, they're getting 60% of women, you know, and you can see the distribution of your responses across those different demographic factors. 00:10:56.799 --> 00:11:04.399 And that's where, you know, as you know, consumers of polling, we can take a look and we can say, like, hey, does that number really make sense? 00:11:04.559 --> 00:11:09.519 Like that doesn't seem to trap with our understanding of, you know, like what this segment of the electorate should look like. 00:11:09.679 --> 00:11:34.080 But that's also where campaigns, people that are actually actioning on the data, you know, get a lot of the value out of polls because you know, candidate, I mean, candidates care a lot about what that top line number looks like, but you know, political professionals, they're looking at the they're looking at the crosstabs to try to figure out, you know, were we underperforming or overperforming so that we can do more advertising, find more votes amongst that subset of the electorate. 00:11:34.240 --> 00:11:37.840 And that's kind of a good inflection point, transition point to the different types of polling. 00:11:38.000 --> 00:11:40.080 You know, you've got your public polling and that's out there. 00:11:40.240 --> 00:11:43.200 It's academic, and it's intended to, I think, kind of be predictive, right? 00:11:43.279
--> 00:11:54.080 You know, an academic poll is out there to try to say, hey, this is where the electorate is today, or this is a prediction of what if the election were held today, it would look like on you know, uh November 3rd. 00:11:54.399 --> 00:11:57.519 And so for that's one type of polling. 00:11:58.080 --> 00:12:03.919 The type of polling that uh signal engages in is on behalf of clients and issue groups. 00:12:04.480 --> 00:12:30.000 And I think what's sometimes tough for people who are not, you know, looking at a ton of polls or are not, you know, you know, in the political as a profession kind of space is the value of polls is to figure out what messages are gonna move voters and then to determine how effective that messaging is. 00:12:30.159 --> 00:12:33.840 So when I'm doing a poll for a client, do I care about the top line numbers? 00:12:34.000 --> 00:12:34.480 Absolutely. 00:12:34.639 --> 00:12:44.720 And people are gonna remember if you missed on a top line in a way that they're not gonna remember if you had the subset of you know under 34 men wrong on a survey. 00:12:44.960 --> 00:12:53.759 But we're doing polls to help people inform decisions and to help people action on the data that we have to win elections. 00:12:53.919 --> 00:13:16.159 And so for us, I think I spend a lot more time thinking about you know, how do we take the responses from our most recent poll and then how do we make decisions and make informed decisions about how to allocate resources and what messages are most effective versus you know getting too bogged down and you know, this is what the top-line political environment looks like today, you know, runs out from the election. 00:13:16.480 --> 00:13:16.960 Yeah. 00:13:17.279 --> 00:13:21.200 I think it's as somebody who's have to make decisions based off what I've seen in this stuff. 00:13:21.279 --> 00:13:37.679 One of the other things that's really important to look at isn't is where like the the geography of the, especially in a space like Texas, like how are we doing in the valley versus Houston versus the the rural area, like and figuring out like where those are. 00:13:37.759 --> 00:13:41.120 I think that's one of the more valuable insights from polling that I'm seeing right now. 00:13:41.679 --> 00:13:49.279 The secondary question is what often don't see on the crosstabs is, and this is something that's been annoys me. 00:13:49.360 --> 00:14:11.600 I think I can usually get if I've had if I if I'm the you know part of the organization that's commissioning the poll, but you don't usually see it is like this is the percentage of people uh of this demographic, how much they make up of the poll and how much they're expected to make up of the demography of this the district, or expected like voter turnout of this demographic, which is to say, was it oversampled? 00:14:11.679 --> 00:14:14.080 Did you have to do any weighting to it and things like that? 00:14:14.240 --> 00:14:26.799 Because as I mean, you can get into this, but like you have if like if you're doing a poll and you get 1200 results for the top line, that means that those that's that error number is for that top line. 00:14:26.879 --> 00:14:34.480 But if you drill down to a hyper-specific, you know, thing beyond half of that poll, that error is going to start getting really big, a lot bigger. 00:14:34.639 --> 00:14:43.919 Can you talk a little bit about just that type of information when people talk about the margin of error and then also how that margin of error balloons when you get down into the crosstabs? 00:14:44.480 --> 00:14:54.879 Yeah, and so I think that's a really, really astute point because we take a look at polls and we'll see a poll that shows, you know, candidate A is up three points over candidate B. 00:14:55.039 --> 00:14:59.679 But if the margin of error on the survey is four points, that's a statistical tie, right? 00:15:00.159 --> 00:15:08.159 And then I think sometimes, and this comes up a lot when I'm talking through these crosstabs and we're trying to, you know, make informed decisions about how to allocate resources. 00:15:08.399 --> 00:15:18.320 You start to delve into the crosstabs, and it's like, well, geez, we're looking at, you know, and this is we're we're looking at non-binary persons of color under the age of 34. 00:15:18.480 --> 00:15:20.240 That cell size is three people. 00:15:20.480 --> 00:15:28.480 So we can't, you know, we can't make an inference about the direction of that subset of the electorate because it's just not enough people. 00:15:28.720 --> 00:15:47.759 And, you know, I think that's something where, you know, holsters, you know, when they're a part of the conversation, the good ones anyway, are you know trying to flag that for clients and say, like, hey, you know, this is a small end size, you know, it's only 30 people, it's only 40 people in a survey of 800, you know, it's directional, it's not prescriptive per se. 00:15:48.080 --> 00:16:03.600 But it's something that we you gotta keep an eye on and have to be careful about because sometimes you see these big swings in subsets of the electorate, and you know, folks online get excited and they say, hey, you know, uh, young people are you know moving dramatically one way or dramatically the other way. 00:16:03.759 --> 00:16:15.039 But if young people make up, you know, 40 people in a you know 600% survey, like it's hard to know because the market there's you know 15, 20 points, right? 00:16:15.200 --> 00:16:23.759 So yeah, like and like like polsters always say this is kind of useful for directional stuff, but it's not necessarily like this isn't like the number per se. 00:16:24.559 --> 00:16:43.279 I think one of the issues that's popping up on the line today, and this will have we'll we'll release a few days from now, but is there's some debate over some recent polling that's come out in Texas on a Marist poll that or mayorist poll that is that was in the field for like 10 or 11
days. 00:16:43.519 --> 00:16:55.679 Like, is what talk a little bit about like how long a field is in the poll and why why people would be criticizing that length of time in the poll this close to the election. 00:16:56.240 --> 00:17:00.799 Well, for a statewide race, that's way too long to be in the field, right? 00:17:00.879 --> 00:17:05.599 I mean, I'm not signal polls are typically in the field for three nights, and sometimes it takes longer. 00:17:05.759 --> 00:17:24.240 I mean, when we're going into you know a county legislative district and there's only you know five, six, seven thousand registered voters, it can take longer for us to collect that data just because there's not very many people for us to actually, you know, reach and the response rates on polls are really, really low. 00:17:24.400 --> 00:17:27.920 But when these projects, you know, stretch out for days and days and days. 00:17:28.000 --> 00:17:32.880 I mean, 10 days is you know, and I'm sure a lot of the folks watching know that are in this space. 00:17:32.960 --> 00:17:37.279 I mean, that's thousands of points of TV that have run over the course of 10 days. 00:17:37.359 --> 00:17:47.599 And you know, the person that answered that survey on day one of that collection period could have a completely different opinion or been exposed to so much on day 10 of that. 00:17:47.759 --> 00:17:56.960 So I think that's why people are critical of those long, drawn-out uh surveys that have collected data over a long period of time, just because a lot changes. 00:17:57.039 --> 00:18:19.359 And I think it's very tough for us to, you know, really feel confident that that top line number is reflective of the actual state of the race the day after that poll comes out of the field, if it's been collected over, you know, a thousand twelve hundred, fifteen hundred uh points of uh media for just one advertising client, right? 00:18:19.440 --> 00:18:26.799 And as your folks are seeing, you know, everyone in their mother's advertising in Texas, so you know that's thousands and thousands of points of TV. 00:18:27.119 --> 00:18:29.920 Hell, sometimes it's even their ex-wife are advertising for them. 00:18:30.319 --> 00:18:44.400 Um so the one of the things that you've mentioned earlier, and it's one of the big topics of conversation when we talked about polling, is people who are it feels like cope, don't know how true it is because it's just like you really can't. 00:18:44.559 --> 00:18:51.519 I mean, we're getting to the point where it's like just go vote, put your nose down, like who cares what the polls say, just go and finish your race. 00:18:51.759 --> 00:19:00.880 But there's gonna be a lot of like blame thrown around before after the election, or if depending on how things go, credit's usually like not thrown around that you're trying to take it. 00:19:01.119 --> 00:19:03.839 But the a lot of blame is gonna be thrown around after. 00:19:04.000 --> 00:19:13.519 And one of the things people are
talking about right now is what you mentioned earlier, the like quote unquote Republican, like the people Republicans who aren't answering polls. 00:19:13.759 --> 00:19:16.240 Now, what are y'all doing to mitigate that? 00:19:16.400 --> 00:19:19.519 And then like and then what you said you did some research on it. 00:19:19.680 --> 00:19:33.759 I guess talk a little bit about like are you is that a real phenomenon that you're uh you're seeing it's a phenomena in uh Brent did the research, not me, so I'm just kind of parroting his uh his ex post from earlier today. 00:19:33.839 --> 00:19:41.839 But it's a phenomena, it's not the scope, the scope of the phenomena is not what I think folks on the right would wish it was. 00:19:42.079 --> 00:19:54.240 It's not an explanation for the struggles that we're seeing, but there is a little bit of an under-response among you know four out of four Republicans compared to four out of four Democrats, but it's well within our capacity to control for it. 00:19:54.319 --> 00:20:04.160 And one of the things that we do is we build out these uh polling universes, you know, we're building them with an understanding of what the electorate should look like. 00:20:04.400 --> 00:20:27.039 And, you know, there are demographic groups less based on partisanship, actually, but more, you know, age and income where, you know, we know it's gonna take more outreach to younger voters than it is to older voters to get those younger voters to actually respond to the survey because young people are not responding at the same rate as someone who's retired sitting at home, you know, watching, you know, Fox News or MSNBC all day. 00:20:27.200 --> 00:20:32.000 And so we've got control for that in the design, and we're able to do it. 00:20:32.079 --> 00:20:42.079 And I wish it was one of those things where we could sit back and say, hey, like we're just we can't get Trump Republicans to take these surveys, but that's just not the reality that we're seeing right now. 00:20:42.240 --> 00:20:52.319 We're seeing, you know, a little bit of under-response, but more than enough response to be able to control for that under-response when we actually are, you know, figuring out what the final sample is gonna look like and do in our waiting. 00:20:52.720 --> 00:20:57.680 Well, I guess the question that rises in my head is you have an under-response. 00:20:57.759 --> 00:21:05.119 And so what's you're gonna do, what's gonna happen regardless, whenever you're doing a polling like this, is you're gonna keep calling the next names on different lists. 00:21:05.279 --> 00:21:18.880 And so you end up having a the question becomes are the people who are ultimately responding more likely to be telling you that they're not voting for a Republican or voting for it or what are they representative of the people who aren't answering? 00:21:19.039 --> 00:21:39.200 And so my question then becomes like, are we seeing are is there any other metric that we're able to use like other consumer data and scoring to look at the people who refused to say that this is ref they this sample is still reflective of the overall like subset that we're trying to get for this poll? 00:21:39.599 --> 00:21:57.920 Yeah, and I think that's where you know we're not just looking at it in the lens of partisanship, we're also looking at it on those other demographic factors that we talked about before, you know, race, age, gender, education, and income, because those are also kind of subindicators of like maybe there's something wrong here. 00:21:58.160 --> 00:21:59.759 And then even, you know, community type. 00:22:00.319 --> 00:22:11.519 I know that you know rural Republican support has eroded, particularly in places like you know, Kansas and Iowa, and it's been like a major cause for concern. 00:22:11.680 --> 00:22:30.640 So it's all factors that you know we can control for as long as we're aware that it's a potential problem and that we're collecting the data to be able to identify, you know, whether someone belongs in a different bucket than the bucket that maybe like we've put them in just based on like their partisanship. 00:22:30.880 --> 00:22:43.119 Because I mean, you know, someone who says, Oh, I'm a Trump supporter, but I also, you know, voted for Kamala Harris and in high income in high education is probably not actually the Trump supporter that you know we're looking for that should go in that bucket. 00:22:43.200 --> 00:22:51.839 And there's a lot of you know validation of the data to make sure that like this makes sense on the back end as we're building out these, as we're building out these samples. 00:22:52.480 --> 00:22:59.599 What are you saying is the biggest surprise or the biggest thing that you're having to control for now that you weren't expecting three months ago? 00:22:59.759 --> 00:23:11.440 Like what are the things what what is the how have things moved within the data that you're seeing all all the time and kind of across the country that's like, oh, this was not what we were expecting, was how where we were gonna be? 00:23:11.839 --> 00:23:19.359 Yeah, I think, you know, I think if you come to me three months ago and it's you know, I'm trying to think back to like where we were in the July 4th, yeah. 00:23:19.519 --> 00:23:20.960 Three three three months ago, right? 00:23:21.039 --> 00:23:25.359 But you know, Iran war was obviously a big topic of conversation. 00:23:25.519 --> 00:23:32.880 And I think there's been a lot of discourse online, and certainly as a Republican political operative, I spend a lot of time on X and a lot of time online. 00:23:33.200 --> 00:23:48.960 But you know, a lot of the discourse online is focused on, you know, are there Trump Republicans that aren't, you know, supporting the Republicans because they're upset about you know foreign policy or they're upset about you know issue du jour of the day and you know Republicans not being MAGA enough. 00:23:49.200 --> 00:23:54.240
And the answer to that is really that's not a perceptible subset of the electorate. 00:23:54.319 --> 00:24:02.079 And what's much, a much, much bigger problem is just Republicans' chronic underperformance with more traditional Republicans. 00:24:02.160 --> 00:24:14.720 And I think you know, if you'd asked me that three months ago, I would have said, hey, you know, I think a lot of that is likely to self-correct between July 4th and you know October 15th, because those people are still really sour on the Democrats. 00:24:14.799 --> 00:24:26.000 They don't love the Democratic candidates that are out there, they don't have any love for the Democrats' policies, and it's not corrected the way that we need it to to meet our maximalist goals on election night. 00:24:26.160 --> 00:24:36.480 And I think that's something that you know Republicans are gonna have to come to grips with if the polls hold and things kind of look the way that we think they might after election day is, you know, how do we win those voters back? 00:24:36.640 --> 00:25:07.200 Voters that, you know, have either A traditionally voted for Republicans and just have a you know bad taste in their mouth about President Trump and the stuff that's been going on in Washington over the last two years, and then how do we win back voters who, you know, maybe cast a ballot in 2016 in a Democratic primary for like a Bernie Sanders, and then they voted for Trump, and then they voted for Biden, and you know, then they were back on the Trump train, and now they're just sort of upset with everybody and feel like their vote doesn't matter and that both parties have failed them, and that there's not really a candidate worth getting off the couch to pull the lever for. 00:25:07.279 --> 00:25:26.880 And, you know, that's the audience that you know is gonna be so important as we look past 2026 and towards 2028, is you know, what can is able to bridge the divide between those people, the sort of quote unquote, you know, Trump uh independent types, and the more traditional Republicans who are also, you know, losing their enthusiasm. 00:25:27.279 --> 00:25:35.039 Well, I my this is more into the opinion of like just political prognosticating, not not polling specifically. 00:25:35.200 --> 00:25:44.640 But like my view of this is basically like the Trump coalition is is all is wholly dependent on Trump. 00:25:44.960 --> 00:26:03.839 No other person is going to be able to slot into the uh in a place in any given state and be able to bring together that coalition because it's so like dispar despite but disparate in its like origin, and that a lot of groups that typically don't get along with one another are still under the same umbrella. 00:26:03.920 --> 00:26:11.680 And I don't see those groups in a long-term perspective, like union and pro business sitting in the same tent for that long, right? 00:26:11.920 --> 00:26:24.960 And so like I long term I'm curious how the how the how a new coalition will will will
form on the on the right, but also on the left, because they're going through a lot of turmoil too. 00:26:25.119 --> 00:26:41.839 It's ultimately gonna come down to who wins the presidency next with a hyper charismatic candidate, whether it's in 28 or 32 or 36, that's gonna be where we really see like a more rigid like back coalition type thing come back together. 00:26:42.079 --> 00:26:50.400 But it's gonna take that highly charismatic person, but also like really kind of weaves their way into building that new coalition. 00:26:50.559 --> 00:26:58.960 Because in a two-party system, like we have, because of and we have a two-party system because we're a first past the post uh election system. 00:26:59.200 --> 00:27:03.279 There's really no way to legislate out of it unless we get past first past the post voting. 00:27:03.759 --> 00:27:11.920 Like, we're going to end up with two parties that always kind of tend towards a close, like a middle ground, right? 00:27:12.000 --> 00:27:19.839 And where you end up having butterfly out from there, and especially now that we've gone away from more geographic-based party systems. 00:27:20.000 --> 00:27:24.720 And so, like, we're always gonna have this kind of this thing, it's gonna ebb and flow. 00:27:24.799 --> 00:27:30.880 And it's like right now, the coalitions are just there's not there's not an ideological bent towards it. 00:27:30.960 --> 00:27:34.400 So it's good, it's it's really who knows how things are gonna end up. 00:27:34.559 --> 00:27:43.519 I say all of that, which is this is probably the first election Trump is still around, but this is gonna be the first election where a lot of those like restraints are thrown off. 00:27:43.599 --> 00:28:08.000 And I think that that just lends to a weakened Republican Party because you know, people on the fringes of the current Trump coalition, like you mentioned, so those kind of like populist like Bernie, Trump, Biden voters, and then you have your like traditional suburban voters, whether they be more left-leaning or right-leaning, are all unhappy in one way with the Republican Party. 00:28:08.079 --> 00:28:15.200 And I think it comes down to, and this is now in the land of like my own predictions, I think it comes down to candidate competence. 00:28:15.440 --> 00:28:38.559 Wherein you have candidates of more of a MAGA variety or of a more traditional Republican variety, but if they're incompetent or they're just really boring on the stump, they're gonna be running into problems versus if you're just regardless of MAGA or traditional, like if they're actually out and campaigning and like running solid campaigns, they're probably doing okay. 00:28:38.799 --> 00:28:49.359 Is that reflected in, is that last bit I said, is that reflected in what you're seeing or like the candidate quality really matters with these kind of polls and how they compare to like the generic Republican ballot? 00:28:49.680 --> 00:28:52.079 Yeah, candidate quality matters a ton. 00:28:52.160 --> 00:29:00.880 And I think one of the things that we see more and more in our polling is that it incumbency is not a benefit with how angry people are on both sides of the aisle. 00:29:01.039 --> 00:29:21.759 So if you're an incumbent politician and you've sat on your butt and not done anything to take advantage of that incumbency and to introduce yourself to people and to build a brand that is specific to you, you know, whether you're a candidate for mayor or a candidate for United States Senate, like you've got some real kind of structural challenges because people are saying, like, hey, it's what have you done for me lately? 00:29:21.920 --> 00:29:24.480 And, you know, they're angry at the establishment. 00:29:24.640 --> 00:29:27.519 And so I'm a big believer in candidate quality. 00:29:27.599 --> 00:29:33.200 I mean, that's why I sometimes, you know, caveat when we start talking about, you know, well, what does the national generic ballot look like? 00:29:33.279 --> 00:29:36.480 It's like, well, we don't vote based on the national generic ballot, right? 00:29:36.559 --> 00:29:42.799 If we voted on the national generic ballot, you know, we could pack it up and call it an election because, you know, Republicans are going to get smoked. 00:29:42.960 --> 00:29:44.720 But candidate quality matters. 00:29:44.880 --> 00:29:51.359 And I agree with you that I don't think it matters so much MAGA Republican or traditional Republican. 00:29:51.519 --> 00:30:08.400 I think, you know, a candidate who is true to themselves and who has the personal charisma is able to overcome being a little bit too MAGA for their state or a little bit too traditional for their state if they're willing to, you know, put in the work and build a brand that's unique to themselves. 00:30:08.640 --> 00:30:30.799 And, you know, I think that's part of the, you know, sort of the magic of what someone like uh Ram Dani has done in New York on the Democratic side of things is you know, there's a thousand socialist candidates who have caught fire nationally and then crashed and burned, you know, in a general election, or, you know, seen their popularity, you know, go into the toilet as soon as they get into the office. 00:30:30.880 --> 00:30:37.119 But he's running, I think, a pretty effective communications operation that's based on his own personal charisma. 00:30:37.200 --> 00:30:46.480 And that's gotta be really scary for Republicans because he's someone who I think we all hope would turn into like a boogeyman and it just has not worked yet. 00:30:46.640 --> 00:30:48.000 So yeah. 00:30:48.319 --> 00:30:54.240 What are your kind of prognostications for how Republicans are gonna do? 00:30:54.319 --> 00:30:56.000 Is it gonna be a super blue wave? 00:30:56.160 --> 00:30:57.440 Is it gonna be a red wave? 00:30:57.839 --> 00:30:59.839 Probably a red wave. 00:31:00.000 --> 00:31:10.960 Is it gonna be a blue wave, or do we think it's gonna be more like 2022, the Biden
midterm, where they were the the party in power was able to do enough to kind of stem the stem the tide? 00:31:11.200 --> 00:31:42.160 Yeah, so I mean, looking at the national generic ballot to go back to a data point that I just was poo-pooing, but in our most recent public survey, national poll conducted by Signal beginning of October, we had the national generic ballot at close to D plus nine, which is roughly analogous to what the average of polls said the generic ballot looked like going into election day in 2018, which was, of course, you know, a big, big democratic wave year in the the middle of the first Trump administration. 00:31:42.480 --> 00:31:57.440 But uh as we've talked about, candidate quality matters, the map matters, you know, there's a lot fewer districts that are held by Republicans in competitive parts of the country in the House than there were in 2018. 00:31:57.680 --> 00:32:02.240 Republicans only have, what is it now, a three-vote majority in the House of Representatives. 00:32:02.480 --> 00:32:03.599 So changes everything. 00:32:04.079 --> 00:32:17.920 What a Democratic what a Democratic wave year looks like in the House, you know, they're probably not going to win 50, 60, 70 house seats the way that uh, you know, some past waves, you know, 2010 for the Republicans, 2018. 00:32:18.079 --> 00:32:22.640 But I think they're the overwhelming favorite to take back control of the House. 00:32:22.799 --> 00:32:32.000 And then I think for Republicans, if I'm prognosticating, like, you know, I feel good and happy about the way that Susan Collins has been able to hang in in Maine. 00:32:32.079 --> 00:32:52.960 You know, I think the Democrats, when you, if you had, you know, given them truth serum at the beginning of the cycle, they would have said, hey, like, we need to win Maine, we need to win North Carolina, and then we're gonna have, you know, like maximalist goals of trying to flip, you know, like a Texas, an Iowa, or an Ohio, and you know, Susan Collins hanging in there, and Maine is sort of a fly in the ointment of that math. 00:32:53.119 --> 00:32:56.480 But you know, they're in all those races and in more too. 00:32:56.559 --> 00:33:01.279 You know, Kansas's polling has been tight, Alaska's polling has been incredibly tight. 00:33:01.519 --> 00:33:15.599 And so I think, you know, I think it's a night, maybe not worth celebrating, but it's a win for Republicans if we end the night in a place where, you know, we've lost the House but have held on to even a tie in the Senate based on where the generic ballot is. 00:33:15.680 --> 00:33:21.119 And, you know, I'm not gonna sit here and say that there's no path where it looks even better than that for Republicans. 00:33:21.200 --> 00:33:33.279 But you know, if you're asking me to, you know, put money on it, I think it's gonna come down to a wire, the wire for the Democrats here and that they've got a real you know puncher's chance of of flipping both houses. 00:33:33.680 --> 00:33:44.480 The thing that concerns me most right now is that that's I I would I would bet that the where things sit, all the states you said right now are statistical ties. 00:33:44.880 --> 00:34:04.319 What worries me is that there are enough late breaking independents, and whether whether that's late breaking to either because of a propensity or it's late breaking because they are just undecidable who either who they're gonna vote for, that in a wave year, what typically happens is those independents break all one direction. 00:34:04.559 --> 00:34:11.199 And the way things are setting up in the news cycle and how the feeling everywhere is I don't think they're gonna break the Republicans' way. 00:34:11.360 --> 00:34:16.320 And if they break the Democrats' way, then we could get wiped out in all those seats. 00:34:16.800 --> 00:34:33.199 Yeah, and I think you know, when we take a look at, you know, issue priorities and sort of attitudes about politics, and you look at the people who are undecided and the people who are sort of in that independent no-party affiliation buckets, they look a lot more like the Democrats than they look like the Republicans. 00:34:33.280 --> 00:34:36.000 I mean, Democrats are, you know, basically laser focused. 00:34:36.079 --> 00:34:39.599 The only issue that they're talking about right now is affordability and cost of living. 00:34:39.679 --> 00:34:49.760 Whereas Republicans, as they sit around the kitchen table, you know, affordability and cost of living is an issue, but it's an issue right alongside immigration and you know some of the other kind of issues de jour of the Republican Party. 00:34:49.840 --> 00:35:07.519 And that's always a bit of a red flag and a warning flag for me as a pollster, where it's like, geez, if the conversation that the independents are having around the kitchen table is the exact same conversation as the conversation the Democrats are having around the kitchen table, like what does that tell us about you know what direction those those voters are gonna break? 00:35:07.679 --> 00:35:12.800 And so I agree with the assessment, but the map structurally still favors Republicans, right? 00:35:12.880 --> 00:35:22.000 Like Democrats need to make it to states like Texas, in Iowa, in Kansas, in Alaska, states that President Trump won fairly comfortably and they're gonna need to win that. 00:35:22.320 --> 00:35:25.679 And that math gets that math gets tough, gets tough quickly. 00:35:25.840 --> 00:35:31.920 And I think you know, in a state like Texas, it could come down to, you know, there's not just two candidates on that Senate ballot, right? 00:35:32.079 --> 00:35:39.039 And you know, you don't have to win 50% of the vote if you've got a libertarian that's winning, you know, two, three, four percent of the vote, right? 00:35:39.199 --> 00:35:58.400 So it's it's gonna be it's gonna be tight because structurally these races favor Republicans based on you know party registration and sort of the
fundamentals, but yeah, it's it's gonna be it's gonna be an interesting last few weeks going into this election, and it's gonna be an interesting election night, and there's gonna be plenty and plenty to talk about afterwards. 00:35:58.639 --> 00:36:02.800 Where can people find where you're talking or you're talking about things and posting stuff? 00:36:03.119 --> 00:36:07.920 Yeah, so you can uh check out our website, signal, that's cygn.al. 00:36:08.559 --> 00:36:15.039 We posted a survey, we post a survey every single month at the beginning of the month, have been dating back to 2022. 00:36:15.119 --> 00:36:16.960 So you can see those trend lines that we talked about. 00:36:17.039 --> 00:36:20.239 You can see how the generic ballot has moved, you can see how things have shifted. 00:36:20.400 --> 00:36:32.719 We're also in the field with a poll here in the middle of October to give one last look before the election of you know what the political environment looks like and you know what to expect as we uh head towards head towards election day. 00:36:32.800 --> 00:36:36.880 And that's all posted on our website, which is cygn.al. 00:36:37.840 --> 00:36:38.480 Awesome. 00:36:38.719 --> 00:36:49.119 Well, thank you so much for joining me and uh looking forward to uh having you on the show again in the future to talk about what other polling stuff, whenever polling becomes a big issue again. 00:36:49.360 --> 00:36:51.599 So thanks for thanks for jumping on with us today. 00:36:51.920 --> 00:36:52.559 Yeah, my pleasure. 00:36:52.639 --> 00:36:53.360 Thanks, Garrett. 00:37:03.599 --> 00:37:09.440 I really enjoyed that conversation with Nick, and at the time, this poll, most recent poll from UH Hobby hadn't come out. 00:37:09.519 --> 00:37:10.960 So we're gonna jump right into that. 00:37:11.119 --> 00:37:16.159 Right now, Paxson is still losing, but he's Taler Rico's lead has shrunk to about two points. 00:37:16.400 --> 00:37:19.280 Every other statewide uh Republican is winning. 00:37:19.440 --> 00:37:22.559 Bo French is the, I think, has the closest margin at a plus two. 00:37:23.039 --> 00:37:27.119 There's threes, fives, like there's a lot they they vary significantly. 00:37:27.360 --> 00:37:32.639 But it's interesting, is like that's kind of how people have been looking at it on private polling for the past few months. 00:37:32.800 --> 00:37:35.760 There's been some public polls that have gone the other way. 00:37:36.000 --> 00:37:45.840 A lot of times, public polls, that we didn't really say it, public polls are there to generate headlines, be close enough to get people to click and to talk and to spur conversation about the election. 00:37:46.239 --> 00:37:50.960 Private polling that's actually private is used for strategic for strategy. 00:37:51.199 --> 00:38:05.199 And like we talked about before, going to the crosstabs and about what's statistically relevant, trying to make sure your samples are big enough that even your crosstab groups are
big enough to be representative to be with outside of the margin so that you're having a decent idea of how things are moving with different people. 00:38:05.360 --> 00:38:07.280 And those are a couple of the big ones. 00:38:07.440 --> 00:38:11.360 So the U of H hobby school poll is an interesting one. 00:38:11.599 --> 00:38:12.880 It's it's reputable. 00:38:12.960 --> 00:38:18.559 I looked at it briefly on the crosstabs because it released just before I'm recording this the day before this airs. 00:38:18.800 --> 00:38:24.079 And you know, the those numbers are are real, a lot of interesting stuff. 00:38:24.559 --> 00:38:28.159 I've spoken a lot about Bo French on this and about how I'm not supporting him. 00:38:28.320 --> 00:38:32.079 What's interesting is still half of people don't know who he is. 00:38:32.239 --> 00:38:37.599 He has for the down ballot folks, he has about the same name ID as Maze Middleton. 00:38:37.679 --> 00:38:40.639 So basically goes the big three in their opponents. 00:38:40.719 --> 00:38:46.159 So that's Patrick, Inajosa, Abbott, Talerico, and Paxton. 00:38:46.480 --> 00:38:54.639 And then they're like near universal name ID, they're 90 plus because they're have all the male people know who in the TV and everyone knows who they are. 00:38:54.880 --> 00:39:06.480 Vicky Goodwin has about 50-50, Maze Milton has about 50-50, and then Bo French has about 50-50, and then everyone else, kind of between 40 and 20 percent, 25% name ID. 00:39:07.119 --> 00:39:13.199 And Bo French is really high, and that's why he's so close because he's had so much negative news. 00:39:13.360 --> 00:39:29.360 But he took, I guess, a lot of advice from folks after he got into so much controversy after the UT game at the beginning of the year, and he's only been posting about, from what I could tell, he's only been posting from what I've seen about oil and gas issues, which is what the railroad commissioner does. 00:39:29.599 --> 00:39:35.599 And so it seems as if he stopped the bleeding and there's not been any ads about it. 00:39:35.760 --> 00:39:44.079 So it's hard to say if anything's gonna come down the pipeline and really push that over because you'd think if anyone was gonna do anything, they would have done it by now because early voting started. 00:39:44.320 --> 00:39:55.039 And so it's very likely that if Paxton is within two points of Talo Rico, or even four points of Talarico, Bo French could still squeak it out. 00:39:55.360 --> 00:40:00.239 Now, we don't know that to be true for sure, but it's it's an interesting thing to note. 00:40:00.480 --> 00:40:03.039 The rest of the ticket is still doing okay. 00:40:03.199 --> 00:40:08.559 Everyone's kind of had it as about a five-point bump between the statewides and Paxton. 00:40:08.719 --> 00:40:13.039 So Paxton's the floor, and then three to five points up is the rest of the statewides. 00:40:13.280 --> 00:40:21.119 Some might be a little bit higher, might be a little bit like towards the three, towards the seven, but that's different, difference from Paxton. 00:40:21.199 --> 00:40:29.760 So that's to say if Patrick were to win by two, someone like uh Huff Heinz would win by seven, and Abbott would win by five, and like Middleton would win by eleven. 00:40:30.079 --> 00:40:35.440 That's the kind of range we're working with here of like kind of the expected outcome. 00:40:35.760 --> 00:40:36.960 That could be wrong. 00:40:37.119 --> 00:40:37.920 We could we don't know. 00:40:38.079 --> 00:40:38.480 We'll see. 00:40:38.639 --> 00:40:42.639 Obviously, we'll know on election day, but that's kind of the general thinking and the general feeling from stuff. 00:40:42.880 --> 00:40:52.159 All the way down the ballot, statewide, like the reps are perform like are polling better, from what I can tell, from what people are saying, from what I've heard from folks. 00:40:52.320 --> 00:41:01.360 I haven't seen the polling myself to know for sure, but that seems to be the general vibe is that the generic state house reps are polling pretty well generally. 00:41:01.519 --> 00:41:09.599 Now, there are a lot of people who are worried about a lot of different races, and right now there are 88 seats that are held by Republicans or won by Republicans last time. 00:41:09.760 --> 00:41:11.599 People have retired and some people are in and out. 00:41:11.679 --> 00:41:20.239 I'm not exactly sure what that makeup is at this moment, but effectively that's about a plus 13 for median, which means they have a 26-seat lead. 00:41:20.320 --> 00:41:24.400 And if you were to lose a seat and gain a seat the other side, you've about 13 to play with. 00:41:51.360 --> 00:41:56.159 So that's interesting for sure, but that's kind of the vibe of it right now. 00:41:56.239 --> 00:42:02.079 The general idea right now is to see like, well, do Republicans hold and then what with what majority? 00:42:02.320 --> 00:42:07.039 And that'll be a big, and if they that that's a big calculus everyone's asking right now. 00:42:07.199 --> 00:42:13.360 A lot of people are trying to make plans for session, and no one's really moving right now because there's too much uh up in the air. 00:42:13.599 --> 00:42:20.719 We'll talk about a little bit later, but depending on what the majority is, if it's a Republican majority, you're gonna see a speaker's race. 00:42:21.440 --> 00:42:24.480 And that'll that's its own, it'll be its own can of worms. 00:42:24.800 --> 00:42:29.440 If it's a large enough Republican majority, Speaker Burroughs will almost certainly keep the gavel. 00:42:29.760 --> 00:42:33.840 If Democrats take over, Democrat will probably take the gavel. 00:42:34.239 --> 00:42:47.199 But if you start getting close to needing 75 votes, you're looking at regardless of who what party takes control of the chamber, what's effectively will be a split kind of power sharing agreement. 00:42:47.440 --> 00:42:56.960 Because so much of the Texas House is reliant on actually having stuff being
able to move through committees and on the floor that needing a lot of votes consistently. 00:42:57.280 --> 00:43:04.880 And it's yet to be seen whether either party can really do it with a majority of less than like 80, 80 to 70. 00:43:05.280 --> 00:43:10.880 So that will be something to look at going as we as we start looking at the day after. 00:43:10.960 --> 00:43:13.760 And we'll be talking about that in the next week or two. 00:43:15.199 --> 00:43:31.679 But one of the more interesting things that's happened over the past week, after the Talo Rico kind of scandal that wasn't a scandal, that was a scandal because he did leave the trail for between 8 and 13 days between depending on who you ask. 00:43:32.239 --> 00:43:37.599 There were a lot of people who were pushing certain narratives about it and really trying to push stuff out there. 00:43:37.760 --> 00:43:44.159 One of whom was a woman with the Blaze named Sarah Gonzalez, who's a fairly popular commentator. 00:43:44.320 --> 00:43:48.000 People follow her all the time and follow her on Twitter and watch her show. 00:43:48.320 --> 00:43:51.360 But she's often like kind of pushing stuff out there. 00:43:51.599 --> 00:43:59.599 And she was really on board and one of the key players in pushing the now debunked uh Linda Health. 00:44:00.239 --> 00:44:02.800 Uh story about Talla Rico. 00:44:03.119 --> 00:44:05.920 And but but she was not one of the people who originated reporting. 00:44:06.000 --> 00:44:06.639 I'm not going to say that. 00:44:06.719 --> 00:44:10.880 She was just one of the people, early people who pushed it out and was really kind of on board with it. 00:44:11.599 --> 00:44:14.960 But we'll we'll save that for for later. 00:44:15.280 --> 00:44:21.280 There has been another thing that she's tweeted out, which from what I can tell is to a degree real. 00:44:21.519 --> 00:44:35.679 People have been getting lots and lots of texts and mail purporting purporting is probably not the right word that give the insinuation that it's from a pro-trans group whose name I don't know off by hand, but I know the acronym is TINT. 00:44:36.239 --> 00:44:42.320 And so, and that their real website is Transtexas.org, and a lot of this stuff links back to it. 00:44:42.400 --> 00:44:48.880 There's hyperlinks and QR codes and all sorts of stuff that go back to Transtexas.org. 00:44:49.199 --> 00:44:52.480 And now if you go to that website, nothing shows up. 00:44:52.559 --> 00:44:59.920 There well, there is a there is a there is just like a one page that says we're aware of the text and mailers. 00:45:00.159 --> 00:45:01.039 We didn't send them out. 00:45:01.199 --> 00:45:04.159 And that kind of what it says what I was about to say. 00:45:04.320 --> 00:45:07.760 But it's just saying that they didn't send out the text and the mailers. 00:45:08.639 --> 00:45:10.639 Now all the information came from the website. 00:45:10.719 --> 00:45:18.960 From the best I can tell, it was pulled sometime between late September and early October because of some of the information that's included and some of the stuff that's been sent out. 00:45:19.199 --> 00:45:25.840 And so, which makes sense for a mailer that you know it's going to take a while for it to for stuff to get approved and sent out. 00:45:26.480 --> 00:45:32.239 What is happening here is what's kind of referred to as the dark arts of politics. 00:45:32.559 --> 00:45:40.400 If you look at the text messages and you look at the mail, none of it is supporting a candidate. 00:45:40.559 --> 00:45:42.559 It's not supporting an issue per se. 00:45:42.719 --> 00:45:45.760 It's not supporting specific legislation. 00:45:46.239 --> 00:45:50.960 And technically, none of it actually says that it's from T E N T. 00:45:51.039 --> 00:45:54.880 And it refers to T E T Tint in the third person. 00:45:55.519 --> 00:46:01.920 There is some stuff that you can maybe say to with the return address, but the return address is printed incorrectly. 00:46:02.159 --> 00:46:11.840 It's labeled the apparently Tint has their headquarters uh near my house in Meadows Place, which is maybe four or five miles from where I live now, but it's also where I lived in high school. 00:46:12.000 --> 00:46:23.679 And I know, and I and I verify this, that every house in Meadows Place is on the Houston numbering grid, which is to say it's far enough from downtown that every digit's five digits. 00:46:25.840 --> 00:46:28.400 Like the and the one I used to live at was one, two. 00:46:28.719 --> 00:46:31.840 Uh, I do recall there being some digits that are like a seven or a twelve. 00:46:32.079 --> 00:46:35.760 So it's either that or the or you're on the Houston numbering system. 00:46:36.639 --> 00:46:40.320 So when I saw that, and I saw that it was a four-digit, it didn't spark me as right. 00:46:40.400 --> 00:46:44.400 And then if you look at it, they they omitted a one, and then it goes to a UPS store. 00:46:44.480 --> 00:46:50.480 And that's actually the the actual mailing address for Tent, but it has a different P.O. 00:46:50.639 --> 00:46:51.039 box. 00:46:51.199 --> 00:46:52.719 So it's different. 00:46:53.119 --> 00:47:09.920 All these things I'm saying, but it's different, lead me to believe that if that someone were to go up the trail, because the information is coded into the mail because they use the mass mailer, and that information is known to the United States Postal Service and the postal inspectors. 00:47:10.079 --> 00:47:27.119 And if law enforcement were to try and pursue some sort of action or to or get that information from USPS and then start asking questions, there is enough in this documents that I do not see that there is a specific like campaign violation necessarily, because they're not they're not advocating for anything. 00:47:27.360 --> 00:47:38.480 There's not it there's it's kind of gray on whether they're like actually if whether there'd be a civil case from trans from tent against the organization. 00:47:38.800
--> 00:47:40.480 I imagine there would be one. 00:47:40.639 --> 00:47:47.039 It may settle and may just drag and may nothing may ever happen of it, but it'd be a it would be a compet it'd be a competitive case. 00:47:47.119 --> 00:47:49.599 It it'd be gray, is why I say it that way. 00:47:49.760 --> 00:47:56.719 But to my knowledge, as a non-attorney, I'm not looking at any of like major violations that they've checked off by what they've done. 00:47:56.960 --> 00:48:23.199 But what they've done is they've highlighted what this organization does, which is helps trans teens talk about being trans and to talk to adults who aren't their parents, specifically when their parents don't support them, about what it's like to be trans and about the laws in Texas, and about, as some have said, how to get around those laws, which people have feelings about about that issue. 00:48:23.280 --> 00:48:25.920 Um I've debated with Luke Messias on this in the past. 00:48:26.159 --> 00:48:32.639 I'm not gonna that part of it's less relevant to what's actually happening. 00:48:32.960 --> 00:48:48.960 Those are being mailed to conservatives, they're being mailed to like strong Republican households that have they probably bought a consumer list of so of people who like who are Republicans who have children, but they may be considered low propensity voters. 00:48:49.119 --> 00:49:05.920 And the idea is for them just to be aware about this organization and for them to feel like this organization is like trying to like solicit their kid or otherwise like recruit their kid and be so mad about that that they want to go and vote and vote Republican because there's been all the anti-trans ads. 00:49:06.239 --> 00:49:09.840 And so this people will say, like, oh, how do you know it's Team Paxton? 00:49:10.000 --> 00:49:11.920 I actually don't think it's Team Paxton. 00:49:12.079 --> 00:49:29.039 If Team Paxton were doing this, that the campaign actually had actual knowledge of and directed this in any way, that would be a pretty major federal campaign violation, I believe, because then it would become an undisclosed or uns and it would become a political advertisement. 00:49:29.280 --> 00:49:41.760 And so if it happened without their input from a group that was not a technically a political entity, then it's entirely possible that this is not political advertising. 00:49:41.920 --> 00:50:11.679 And this is getting into very murky waters of what is and what isn't political advertising, magic words that can and cannot be said by certain organizations that really requires like an expertise in just campaign finance law, campaign law, election law, and appellate law that no one on my show, like that I've had on this show or myself included, could really like claim to have any sort of knowledge of. 00:50:11.840 --> 00:50:20.400 So when I say I when I speak, I don't speak definitively, but I will say that it's coming from somebody who's trying to get Republicans to vote. 00:50:20.639
--> 00:50:22.239 It's a scare tactic. 00:50:22.400 --> 00:50:24.239 I I I've seen it from both sides. 00:50:24.320 --> 00:50:33.760 You'll see things where I know of the Republican the some Republican tactics just from lore, stuff like you can find on on Wikipedia. 00:50:33.840 --> 00:50:43.119 If you look at the Wikipedias for some classic folks, like Lee Atwater, Carl Rove, Roger Stone, there are different kinds of themes of stories. 00:50:43.440 --> 00:50:54.079 Safe stuff like this, but also stuff like paying homeless people to go to events or telling them that there's going to be free beer and event, college, homeless people, college kids, etc. 00:50:54.880 --> 00:51:14.239 There's stuff about like trying to give a campaign donation under like I think the Roger Stone's example was like the young socialist of America to the McGovern campaign in 72 and stuff, or some dial ballot race, so that then you can say, oh, look, the socialists scale the money, the socialists support them. 00:51:14.400 --> 00:51:16.320 You know, that type of stuff. 00:51:16.480 --> 00:51:32.639 There's the famous Willie Horton ad, which was, you know, widely described in many ways, and is hot at least, and at least in the college classes I took, as being like a way to gin up racist support against, I believe, Dukakis. 00:51:32.880 --> 00:51:41.920 If I remember correctly, it was somebody that Duke the that was Willie Horton did something while he was on a furlough or something. 00:51:42.079 --> 00:51:43.039 I don't recall that issue. 00:51:43.119 --> 00:51:44.159 I wasn't even born yet. 00:51:44.480 --> 00:51:50.239 But these are certain things that kind of pop up over history. 00:51:50.800 --> 00:51:56.960 If you really want to look at some crazy stuff that happened in the 1800s and the 1900s, I mean that's a trip down. 00:51:57.119 --> 00:52:00.719 That's a that's a trip down history because they used to do all the things a lot worse. 00:52:00.880 --> 00:52:15.199 Apparently, every president had several love children of varying degrees of love involved, and the like it was all pretty, pretty gutter, gutter, gutter-like. 00:52:15.280 --> 00:52:23.199 And I touched on that last week, and maybe I'll have someone on in the future to talk more about the history of that, but that might just be an audience of me being interested in it. 00:52:23.280 --> 00:52:25.760 So I'm not gonna really go down that trail too much. 00:52:26.000 --> 00:52:32.880 All that to say, when people are saying, like me, are saying, like, look at this, I called it a Psyop earlier. 00:52:33.039 --> 00:52:36.639 It's it seems to be, at first, I thought it was kind of poorly executed. 00:52:36.719 --> 00:52:40.400 The more I'm looking at it and I look at it, they cover their tracks pretty well. 00:52:41.679 --> 00:52:44.000 I think it will come out who it is. 00:52:44.079 --> 00:52:46.480 I don't think it will come out until after the election. 00:52:46.719 --> 00:52:55.760 And you have folks like Sarah
Gonzalez, who has a large account who are going to be really amplifying it and can kind of lean into it and then not even address it afterwards, because who cares? 00:52:55.920 --> 00:53:04.800 Because the the count, the simple counter to it is well, this organization does exist and it's pretty terrible that they exist, quote unquote. 00:53:05.119 --> 00:53:07.840 And you know, what do you say to that? 00:53:08.159 --> 00:53:10.000 I mean, if you want to talk about issue. 00:53:10.159 --> 00:53:14.960 So it seems like a fairly well-designed Psyop, if as one goes. 00:53:15.199 --> 00:53:19.920 So that's if you're wondering why you're getting those texts, that is the answer. 00:53:20.159 --> 00:53:28.000 The last thing I want to touch on, I had some tweets go pretty viral on Texas Twitter this weekend. 00:53:28.239 --> 00:53:34.079 Governor Abbott was at the mansion this weekend, and he had Governor DeSantis in town. 00:53:34.239 --> 00:53:40.559 It was for the UT tailgate, so they he does a big event for UT once a year uh for one of the home games. 00:53:40.719 --> 00:53:45.119 The Governor DeSantis came in for because we're playing Florida and we lost, sadly. 00:53:45.360 --> 00:53:52.079 But TMZ uh was is in the event because they're press and they're they're interviewing Governor Abbott quickly. 00:53:52.239 --> 00:53:59.679 He's got the Texas Cowboys, which is the name of a student organization that handles Smokey the Cannon after after touchdowns behind them. 00:53:59.840 --> 00:54:02.400 He's wearing one of their hats and they're just talking. 00:54:02.480 --> 00:54:03.760 He offers the guy a shiner. 00:54:04.079 --> 00:54:07.360 The guy says he's gluten-free, and they're just talking. 00:54:07.599 --> 00:54:09.920 And Abbott's just being social and hospitable. 00:54:10.079 --> 00:54:16.079 People who ever get to interact with Governor Abbott when he's in more of a social aspect, no, he's dude's really funny. 00:54:16.719 --> 00:54:18.800 He's genuinely a witty guy. 00:54:18.880 --> 00:54:22.880 He's quick comebacks, clever, likes to make a joke, likes to laugh. 00:54:23.199 --> 00:54:31.199 And he you see it in some interviews like this, where it's a little less like, you know, I'm talking about a policy position type stuff. 00:54:31.360 --> 00:54:32.719 And it was it's really good to see it. 00:54:32.800 --> 00:54:34.239 He seemed really loose. 00:54:34.559 --> 00:54:37.760 And by the end of it, the guy volunteers to chug the beer. 00:54:37.920 --> 00:54:40.000 He chugs the shiner, gluten-free guy. 00:54:40.159 --> 00:54:44.639 Apparently, he told Harvey at TMZ that he was having dummy troubles the next couple days. 00:54:44.800 --> 00:54:47.840 But, you know, I I said it, I said it on X. 00:54:48.639 --> 00:54:52.719 Governor Abbott, like people under why he keeps winning. 00:54:52.800 --> 00:54:55.679 They keep wondering how he keeps getting his way at the legislature. 00:54:55.840 --> 00:55:02.559 It's like he just talked a reporter who
was there to, you know, what whatever, into drinking a shiner just by offering it to him. 00:55:02.719 --> 00:55:04.159 And then the guy being like, you know what? 00:55:04.239 --> 00:55:06.639 It would be a good idea, fun to drink a beer with you. 00:55:07.039 --> 00:55:07.519 100%. 00:55:08.079 --> 00:55:13.199 I mean, it's one of those quintessential definitions of like politics, like who do you want to have a beer with? 00:55:13.360 --> 00:55:15.519 Apparently, that reporter decided Greg Abbott. 00:55:15.679 --> 00:55:24.639 And so I think it was really emblematic of like why Governor Abbott has been such a good public, like a good politician, and for so long. 00:55:24.800 --> 00:55:31.599 And I will say, because quick reminder, I worked for him in the last campaign, and so I'm a big fan, I'm still a big fan. 00:55:31.840 --> 00:55:34.239 So I will say that, but I think it's interesting. 00:55:34.400 --> 00:55:44.079 I will I also want to note that it is when you're looking at indicators going into the last couple weeks. 00:55:44.400 --> 00:55:48.400 One thing I look at is who's a little bit looser, who's having a little bit more fun. 00:55:48.719 --> 00:55:50.239 Kind of like going into a big game of football. 00:55:50.320 --> 00:55:51.599 Who's like having fun? 00:55:51.920 --> 00:55:54.639 They're ready, they're doing their stuff, but who's having fun? 00:55:55.119 --> 00:55:58.000 And Governor Abbott's having fun. 00:55:58.320 --> 00:56:03.199 That tells me a lot that I that I would want to know going into early voting. 00:56:03.360 --> 00:56:08.880 I think Republicans are going to, in Texas at least, are gonna outperform the polling. 00:56:09.199 --> 00:56:20.559 I think enough Republicans will probably come home that we lose some seats in places we didn't want to at the beginning of the s of the the cycle, but I think we hold on to pretty much everything. 00:56:20.719 --> 00:56:22.400 I think Paxson's still in danger. 00:56:22.480 --> 00:56:24.719 He's he could still he's still in the danger zone. 00:56:25.280 --> 00:56:30.159 He could have a misstep in or something else could come out and it could take him a point or two and that could be enough. 00:56:30.320 --> 00:56:32.480 I think Bo French is in the danger zone. 00:56:32.639 --> 00:56:34.880 And technically, I think Governor Abbott's in the danger zone. 00:56:34.960 --> 00:56:40.239 I just don't see him making the kind of mistake that would put him over into losing territory. 00:56:40.559 --> 00:56:41.840 But we'll see. 00:56:42.079 --> 00:56:43.199 One other thing I want to touch on. 00:56:43.280 --> 00:56:45.599 I was about to, I was about to wrap up, but it came to me. 00:56:45.920 --> 00:56:56.639 If you're on Twitter or if you're on Facebook at all, you're gonna see people talking about early voting, who's early voting, where the numbers are coming from, kind of what those numbers look like. 00:56:57.280 --> 00:57:14.079 Unless it is a neutral or reputably straight talking consultant or reporter talking about these numbers and justifying their opinion, do not try and make your own opinion on that. 00:57:14.239 --> 00:57:16.159 That is worse than reading tea leaves. 00:57:16.239 --> 00:57:20.079 You like there is a lot of presuppositions that go into it. 00:57:20.239 --> 00:57:22.960 There's a lot that can be gleaned from it. 00:57:23.519 --> 00:57:27.840 But voting history, primary voting history is a great indicator. 00:57:28.000 --> 00:57:33.679 In a general election, you're gonna have a lot more general election voters where you need more information about those people. 00:57:34.000 --> 00:57:49.280 And if you're on a consumer side of thing, if you do not have access to like the best like political data, you're not gonna be able to make much of an inference about who has already voted and their expected share of the overall vote. 00:57:49.440 --> 00:58:05.280 Because what will happen is sometimes people who are if there's an enthusiasm gap, you'll see whomever that is, Democrats, Republican, get up to a big lead or big lead in certain areas, and then the other team will will start catching up, or they won't catch up, or whatever else. 00:58:05.519 --> 00:58:12.559 So what I'm telling you is there there might you you want to follow it loosely, but don't take it for for granted at all. 00:58:12.719 --> 00:58:14.719 Don't look, don't look at it too much. 00:58:15.039 --> 00:58:18.400 And yeah, so that's just a little PSA from from me here. 00:58:18.559 --> 00:58:20.639 But I appreciate you for watching this far. 00:58:20.880 --> 00:58:22.719 Like and subscribe if you haven't already. 00:58:22.800 --> 00:58:23.760 We really appreciate it. 00:58:23.920 --> 00:58:26.480 The numbers on the show are just trending up significantly. 00:58:26.559 --> 00:58:31.280 We're getting like three and four times as much as we used to get across platforms. 00:58:31.679 --> 00:58:39.199 And I thank you a lot, especially the the people who have come from watching the shorts that we're we're putting out every day or multiple times a day. 00:58:39.360 --> 00:58:42.639 Like, we really appreciate y'all for being here. 00:58:42.880 --> 00:58:44.719 And right now we're talking election. 00:58:44.960 --> 00:58:52.159 As soon as the election's done, we'll start talking about Texas legislature and the occasional big issue over on the federal side. 00:58:52.559 --> 00:58:56.079 But until then, we've got two more weeks of election coverage. 00:58:56.639 --> 00:58:58.079 We'll see you next week. 00:58:58.320 --> 00:58:59.199 Go out and vote. 00:58:59.360 --> 00:59:00.000 Have a good one. 00:59:00.320 --> 00:59:01.199 Bye guys.
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