The Daily Populous Monday August 5th, 2024 evening edition
Authored by newsweek.com and submitted by sandyWB

Donald Trump's campaign team has accused polls showing Vice President Kamala Harris beating him of being "fake" and "manipulated" to favor the presumptive Democratic nominee.

Brian Hughes, a senior Trump campaign adviser, lashed out at a recent survey from CBS News and YouGov that showed Harris with a 1-point lead over Trump nationally—50 percent to 49 percent. On average, the pair is tied with 50 percent each across several key swing states.

In his statement, Hughes shared a memo that said the poll of 3,102 registered voters sampled more liberals and fewer conservatives than a previous survey, and that Trump would be leading 51 percent to 49 percent if weighted correctly.

"The Fake News Media continue to help dangerously liberal Kamala hide her record of economic failure and soft on crime policies. Now, as this analysis shows they'll even put a finger on the scale of polling to inflate results for her," Hughes said.

He continued: "This analysis is why the American people are seeing through it and will not allow this national gaslighting campaign to win. Despite this manipulated result, from CBS/YouGov it's worth noting that in July and August of 2020, their data showed Biden leading by 10 nationally, reflecting a net positive movement of almost +10 to President Trump this election cycle."

Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally at Georgia State University in Atlanta on August 3, 2024. Trump's team has called recent polling showing him trialing Vice President Kamala Harris "fake." Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally at Georgia State University in Atlanta on August 3, 2024. Trump's team has called recent polling showing him trialing Vice President Kamala Harris "fake." CHRISTIAN MONTERROSA/AFP/Getty Images

The CBS News/YouGov poll is the latest survey that shows Harris leading Trump in the 2024 race, overturning the deficit recorded by President Joe Biden before he dropped out of the race on July 21.

A number of polling aggregators show that Harris has overtaken Trump in terms of national averages.

FiveThirtyEight's national average poll tracker has Harris ahead of Trump by 1.6 percentage points, 45.3 percent to 43.7 percent.

Pollster Nate Silver, who founded the polling aggregator and now uses a similar methodology in his predictions, is also showing that Harris is ahead of Trump on average, 45.5 percent to 44.1 percent.

The Polling USA social media account, which aggregates national surveys, has Harris with a 1.7 percent lead over Trump as of August 4.

The memo shared by Trump's team also said that the latest CBS News/YouGov poll was "entirely the result of a methodological decision allowing ideology to change significantly, while maintaining weights on age, partisanship, and race to make the survey appear not to have been manipulated."

Bill Mitchell, a conservative political pundit, expressed a similar sentiment on X, formerly Twitter.

"Why do people keep acting like these polls aren't completely fake? Folks these polls are completely fake. Imagine if I put out a poll with an R+8 sample," Mitchell wrote. "Trump would be ahead by 10 points. Do you think the media would notice that. Of course."

Newsweek has contacted CBS News and YouGov for comment via email.

Trump has long cited polls showing him beating Biden in the 2024 race as proof of his popularity and a signal that he is the favorite to retake to White House.

On X, political commentator Ed Krassenstein, a frequent Trump critic, commented on the change of opinion about polling numbers among the former president's supporters.

"MAGA is breaking down. They are back to calling the polls fake just because they don't reflect what they want them to say," Krassenstein wrote. "It's funny how they touted the polls when Trump was up."

BrizzelBass on August 5th, 2024 at 12:16 UTC »

I've got such a case of MAGAt fatigue at this point. November can't come quick enough

lifeofrevelations on August 5th, 2024 at 11:53 UTC »

Stupid-ass trump thinks everything he doesn't like is "fake". What a pathetic baby.

sandyWB on August 5th, 2024 at 11:52 UTC »

Why is Trump such a whiny loser?