Voters contacted by cellphone are more likely to vote for Doug Jones.

[mia]

Why polls showing a 20-point spread in Alabama aren’t actually ‘wrong’

December 11 at 11:48 AM

Remember: Even during 2016, an easier-to-predict presidential election, four different pollsters took the same raw data and came up with several different possible interpretations of the same poll data. It’s important to also note that, unlike in that experiment, the recent polls in Alabama are also not using the same raw data, which compounds the variations in results.

For example, the Fox News poll found a huge advantage for the Democrat, Jones, among those contacted by cellphone.

“Alabama voters who were interviewed on cellphones are +30 for Jones, while the race is roughly even among all others,” Fox’s Dana Blanton wrote. “The fact that traditional, high-quality probability samples, like the Fox News Poll, include both landline and cellphone numbers may be why these polls show Jones doing relatively well compared to automated or blended polls.”

In other words, polls that exclude cellphones might underestimate overall support for Jones. The Emerson poll, for example, was landline only. (Calling cellphones is more complicated than calling landlines because of a federal law that mandates hand-dialing.)

For what it’s worth, the Post-Schar School poll completed at the end of November didn’t find the same chasm between those reached by cellphone and those called on landlines. On landlines, Moore and Jones were tied; on cellphones, Jones had a 4-point lead.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2017/12/11/why-polls-showing-a-20-point-spread-in-alabama-arent-actually-wrong/?utm_term=.ed327b5d39c3

I wonder if cellphone users are more likely to vote.

[Fred Sanders]

1. Emerson College is a landline only outfit and a favorite of Trump:

Emerson College poll, meanwhile, only surveyed people with landline phones — a demographic that, like Trump’s supporters, has been shown to skew older and whiter. According to 2016 data from the CDC, around 70 percent of Americans between the ages of 25 and 34 live in households with only wireless phones, compared to 21 percent of people 65 and over. Just 45 percent of white American adults live in wireless-only households — the lowest percentage for any demographic group.

https://www.theverge.com/2017/2/9/14558290/trump-polls-twitter-media-fake-news

[mia]

2. Interesting. "Just 45 percent of white American adults live in wireless-only households "

I hope that the landline only white adults in Alabama believe the Fox news hype that Moore is going to win and decide that it's okay to stay on their couches on election day.

[IronLionZion]

3. They're also more likely to believe Moore is being persecuted like Jesus

I really wish many of those folks would let go and let God handle it. They should just stay home on election day and send thoughts and prayers.