Not spot on.
As I noted, the GOP Ohio senate primary should be a test of how accurate pollsters have become in their efforts to tap into voters’ minds and intentions.
Here’s what they said before the voting:
| Emerson (April 30) | Vance 26, Mandel 24, Dolan 21, Gibbons 17, Timken 8, Pukita 2, Patel 2 | Vance +2 |
| FOX News (April 25) | Vance 23, Mandel 18, Dolan 11, Gibbons 13, Timken 6, Pukita 1, Patel 1 | Vance +5 |
Here’s how the voting turned out:
Vance, 32.2, Mandel 23.9, Dolan 23.3 Vance + 8.3
Some news articles — one, I’m irritated to say, in the Times — about this primary have said this is a big victory for Trump, because at some recent point Trump waved his arm toward Vance. Vance was trailing, the article says, until Trump gave him his support.
That’s sloppy inference for which there is no proof, not even a putative pre-primary poll which might have asked voters, “Are you waiting to hear who Trump supports before you make a decision?”
As Dean Obeidallah posted on Twitter, “JD Vance did NOT win because Trump endorsed him- Vance won because right wing billionaire Peter Thiel was able to LEGALLY donate nearly $14 million to Vance’s campaign via a Super PAC. Our political system is legally sanctioned corruption.”
Although no research has yet been produced to correlate money spent on a campaign with numbers of votes, Obeidallah’s point makes more sense to me than Trump’s garbled endorsement.