Hillary Clinton is facing uncertainty about her wellness and battling “self-inflicted headwinds.” Donald Trump is still seen as a riskier choice. And the candidates’ supporters disagree over just how great America is. This is HuffPollster for Friday, September 16, 2016.
VOTERS HAVE BECOME MORE CONCERNED ABOUT CLINTON’S HEALTH - HuffPollster: “Hillary Clinton is back on the campaign trail after a weekend bout with pneumonia, but the episode left many Americans unsure about the state of her health, a new HuffPost/YouGov survey finds…. just 39 percent of Americans currently believe that Clinton is in good enough physical condition to effectively serve as president for the next four years, according to the poll. A nearly equal 38 percent say she isn’t in good enough condition, and 23 percent say they are unsure. That marks a significant shift from just over a week ago, when an Economist/YouGov survey posing the same question found that 52 percent of Americans believed Clinton was in good enough shape, 33 percent didn’t think she was and 16 percent didn’t know….Republicans have long been willing to cast aspersions on Clinton’s health, but until recently, those attacks seemed to have little resonance beyond those already disinclined to vote for her. The latest survey, however, shows increased uncertainty among some of her supporters. Although 64 percent of Democrats said in the most recent poll that Clinton was in good enough condition, that’s down 20 points from the previous survey. Few believe outright that she is unhealthy, but more now say that they’re not sure.” [HuffPost]
TRUMP IS VIEWED AS RISKIER THAN CLINTON, BUT ALSO MORE TRANSFORMATIVE - Patrick Healy and Dalia Sussman: “Most voters consider Donald J. Trump a risky choice for president, saying he lacks the right temperament and values, but he is seen as more transformative and better at handling the economy than Hillary Clinton, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll…. Sixty-seven percent of voters see Mr. Trump as a risky choice for president, compared with 51 percent who hold that view about Mrs. Clinton… Several Trump supporters said in follow-up interviews that they believed he was worth the risk, given the economic and security challenges facing the nation. Forty-eight percent of voters think Mr. Trump could bring real change to Washington, a 12-point edge over Mrs. Clinton; another 48 percent think he could not bring change…. ‘The risky part with Trump is the fact of his rhetoric, how he says things,’ said Patrick Kellegher, 52, a political independent and a retired deputy sheriff from Anaconda, Mont. ‘But I think he is outside the known government circles.’ He added, ‘I think Trump will bring about real change because he’s looking at it through a different scope.’” [NY Times]
‘SELF-INFLICTED HEADWINDS’ ARE HURTING CLINTON - Amy Walter: “When it comes to the current political environment, Hillary Clinton couldn’t ask for much better…. Yet, even with these advantages, the race has tightened. The reason: Clinton has created her own headwinds. It’s been a terrible couple of weeks for Clinton…. At the national level, the race is looking more and more like a ‘traditional’ Republican versus Democrat election. After months of fighting with/and/or scaring off a significant portion of the GOP electorate, Trump seems to have consolidated most – though, importantly, not all of the GOP base. Clinton continues to overperform with college-educated white voters, but young voters have not rallied behind her as they did to Obama. Instead, many voters under 45 years old are parking themselves with Libertarian nominee Gary Johnson. Whether they stay with him through November is a critical question. Democrats are also worried about her ability to get non-white turnout to 2012 levels. At the Electoral College level, Clinton maintains an advantage. But, it is shakier than it was just a few weeks back….At its core, Clinton has an enthusiasm problem while Trump has a structural problem. ” [Cook Political]
YOUNG VOTERS FAVOR CLINTON, BUT NOT ENTHUSIASTICALLY - Millennial likely voters in a set of 11 battleground states support Clinton over Trump by 28 points, 56 percent to 28 percent, in a two-way race, up from a 21-point margin in July, according to a poll conducted for the progressive groups NextGen Climate and Project New America by the Democratic firm Global Strategy Group. With third party candidates included, Clinton takes 48 percent to Trump’s 23 percent, with Libertarian Party nominee Gary Johnson at 13 percent, Green Party nominee Jill Stein at 8 percent, and 8 percent undecided or not planning to vote for president.
Clinton’s biggest challenge among millennials isn’t that she’s in danger of losing them to Donald Trump, whom they “continue to despise,” according to the poll, which was conducted online in August. Instead, Clinton needs to convince young voters that she’s a good enough alternative that it’s worth turning out, and picking her over a third party candidate. Thirty-six percent of millennial voters say that on the issues most important to them, there’s no real difference between her and Trump, down slightly from the 41 percent who believed it in July.
“Turnout is going to be really important this cycle, but I think what’s interesting in this cycle is that the line between turnout and persuasion is much more blurry than it was before,” Global Strategy Group’s Andrew Baumann told reporters Thursday. “These millennial voters really don’t like Trump. They’re not enthusiastic about Hillary. So her goal is to keep voters from voting third party or also from staying home.” [Full results]
ONE POLL HAS TRUMP UP BY 6 POINTS - Noah Bierman: “Donald Trump’s lead over Hillary Clinton in the USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times national tracking poll grew to nearly six percentage points on Thursday, his largest advantage since his post-convention bounce in July. The biggest reason appears to be an increase in the likelihood of Trump supporters who say they plan to vote, combined with a drop among Clinton supporters on that question. The nominees are now roughly equal in the voting commitment of their supporters, erasing an advantage previously held by Clinton…. Trump’s overall advantage in the poll coincides with other polls that show him closing the gap with Clinton. Because of differences in methodology, Trump tends to perform about six percentage points better in the USC/L.A. Times poll than in other polls.” [LA Times]
The L.A. Times/USC tracker asks vote intention differently than any other poll - The reason enthusiasm matters so much in this poll is that vote preferences are estimated from a question that reads “What is the percent chance that you will vote for…” and a question that asks what is the percent chance the respondents will vote. The implication is that Trump supporters are giving higher chances of voting and of their vote for Trump, leading to an overall advantage for the Republican candidate. The poll isn’t included in HuffPost Pollster’s averages because the ballot question is based on percentages rather than the typical “who would you vote for?” question.
TRUMP, CLINTON VOTERS DISAGREE ON AMERICA’S GREATNESS - Scott Clement and Jim Tankersley: “The 2016 election has opened an extraordinary chasm between supporters of the two leading candidates over the direction of the country, well beyond the divisions that existed in the 2008 campaign, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll. According to the poll, 8 in 10 registered voters who support Republican Donald Trump say that the United States is less great than in the past, compared with just about 2 in 10 of those who support Democrat Hillary Clinton….In 2008, backers of Democratic nominee Obama were more negative about the country’s direction than voters who supported Republican John McCain….Americans who lament generational decline say they do not feel alone in their struggles. Over 8 in 10 say that people in other groups are also falling behind, while less than 2 in 10 say other groups are making gains.” [WashPost]
MOST AMERICANS DISAGREE WITH SITTING DURING THE NATIONAL ANTHEM - John Breech - “In two recent polls that were both conducted within the past week, a majority of respondents said that they disagree with [NFL quarterback Colin] Kaepernick’s decision to protest racial inequality and police brutality by not standing for the national anthem. In one poll, which was conducted by Reuters, 72 percent of Americans said that they thought Kaepernick’s behavior was unpatriotic…. 70 percent of whites disagreed with Kaepernick’s stance, while only 40 percent of racial minorities disagreed with the 49ers quarterback. Although many respondents disagree with Kaepernick’s stance, 64 percent of all the people who were surveyed agreed that Kaepernick has a constitutional right to protest and shouldn’t be punished by the NFL. In another poll, which was conducted by Survey Monkey, 44 percent of people said they are ‘not supportive at all of Kaepernick’s protest.’ Another 29 percent said they did support it and the rest were unsure.” [CBS]
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FRIDAY’S ‘OUTLIERS’ - Links to the best of news at the intersection of polling, politics and political data:
-Matt Ferner notes that most voters view Donald Trump as unqualified ― but some are supporting him anyway. [HuffPost]
-Jim Norman writes that Americans no longer overwhelmingly prefer the GOP to protect them from foreign threats. [Gallup]
-The latest Fox News national poll shows Hillary Clinton’s lead down to one point among likely voters. [Fox]
-Charles Franklin charts how Gary Johnson and Jill Stein affect the Trump vs. Clinton margin. [Twitter]
-Andrew Flowers explains how a flawed survey question led to undercounting the number of evictions. [538]