USC Dornsife/L.A. Times Daybreak National Tracking: 11/7 - Trump +3.2

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Wow, after being Safe R two days ago, it now looks as if the election is Safe D again.

Ratings change: Safe D  --> Safe R

Actually, it would be Safe R if Trump led by 1 point. The fact that he leads by 3 makes it Super Ultra Mega Rock Solid R.

Come on man, let's not overreact to a few polls. I wonder if Trump will win the popular vote by 3 but lose in a landslide in the Electoral College, though? The NBC polls definitely give me cause for concern! Maybe the election is still Likely D, after all?

Ratings change: Safe R --> Likely D 

Okay, I'll stop.

I am pretty sure we're in this different tranche of how they handle the likely voter or even registered voter electorate right now that is explaining the difference in the polling. Those clinging to a D+5 or D+6 model have Clinton with a lead. Those that are letting the electorate stay where it is based on the sample they get have Trump leading. More data points need to be made available before I can confirm.

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lol the crosstabs are ridiculous junk as well. We'll see if this s[Inks] tracker improves at all as time goes on, but for now it is firmly in the junk category. The only interesting part for me is that the voters expect Clinton to win by a wide margin.

I don't think that's a good narrative for Clinton. As this race stays closer than expected and Trump looks like he can pull it off, the undecideds may think it's OK to get aboard the Trump train.

It's usually the candidate that beats the expectation game that gets the boost in from the undecideds in the end.

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Trump now up by 7. Still want to defend this trash heap?

If one is intrested in trend, it indeed gives some information. I don't believe, Trump is +7 now, but I don't believe either, Clinton was +12 as ABC/Washington and Ipsos/Reuters showed.

Or is ABC pollster a trash heap as well?

Clinton was never ahead by that much.

Clinton was +15 with LV in the Reuters pile of garbage and +12 in the ABC/WashPo trash heap of an outlier poll.

An honest assessment had it at about Hillary! +5 or +6 at one point, just like an honest assessment right now has it at about Trump +1 or Trump +2.

Not to say that this LA Times poll is rubbish. The track record for this methodology was pretty strong in 2012. However, until we have more LV data points, I look at this thing similarly to how I look at the Reuters poll -- for trendlines.

(Keep in mind most other national polls (aside from Rasmussen) are RV right now. Reuters just started quoting LV in their press articles. It's an apples and oranges kind of thing until the polling methodology switch completely changes over in the next few weeks to a month.)

Overall, it suggests roughly a 4-point bounce from the poll's inception and a 7-point bounce from 7/20, the only day Hillary! lead in the survey.

The overall bounce is pretty much in line with what we've been seeing from peak Hillary!

For those into decimals, it's 47.4% Trump, 40.1% Clinton in this latest dump, the trendline is still moving up slightly for the Donald.

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For those that like decimals:

Trump 46.2 (+.1%)
Clinton 42.1 (+.2%)

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Latest results from the only national poll currently showing a Trump lead, as cited by Donald Trump

USC/LA Times national tracking poll (8/1):
Trump - 45.3 (-.9)
Clinton - 43.1 (+1)
(#) denotes change from previous day

The two biggest Trump/two worst Hillary! days are about to roll off this survey in the next few days, so it will be interesting to see where this poll is come Thursday morning.

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It really is interesting how this poll has consistently come up with numbers always about 6 or 7 points more Trump leaning than the average.

It's probably the turnout assumptions, which I don't think they've publicly released.

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USC/LA Times national tracking poll (8/2):
Trump - 45.3 (-/-)
Clinton - 43.7 (+.6)
(#) denotes change from previous day

http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-pol-usc-daybreak-poll-methodology-20160714-snap-story.html
(not on the polling-specific page yet from USC, just the LA Times for now).

Trump has one more +7 day left on this poll to roll off, which is tomorrow, before the Hillary! bounce from the DNC began in earnest.

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The fault in a moving average lies in its inability to reflect a major change in the underlying reality.  Consider what happened on May 2. 2011 and what that did for approval polls of President Obama. Polls from before then  suddenly became suspect.

Basically, Special Forces whacked Osama bin Laden. As I recall an approval poll for Virginia went from the high 40s to the mid 50s overnight.

Or try something apolitical. Texas is prone to a phenomenon known as a Blue Norther.  Before the dry and much colder air mass moves in, temperatures could be as high as the mid 80s under a clear sky even in January.  So let's look at the daytime highs in the five days before the Blue Norther comes by in Dallas.

Daytime highs are 72, 68, 77, 84, 81, and 85F. A rolling average of the daytime highs isn't that silly; that's how things are typically in Phoenix at the same latitude and often similarly low in humidity. The next day the temperatures reaches 82 at 1:30. Then, all of a sudden, the wind shifts from south to north, the sky goes overcast, and the temperature plummets. At 2PM one has overcast conditions, a strong north wind, and a temperature or 55F. By 3PM the temperature is down to 39F. On the next day people awaken in Dallas to find that if they go out to get the paper they find a sub-freezing 24F.

Weather forecasters do not use rolling averages of temperature to predict the daily weather.  The temperature of even two days earlier has practically no value in predicting the daily high temperature that day.   

Meh. Rolling averages are generally fine for tracking polls of this sort. This is likely the first of many that will be employing this kind of methodology over the cycle. You just have to understand the trendlines, which is what these kind of polls are mainly about anyway.

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Now it is Trump +1. Might the final poll showing Trump ahead finally topple on the rcp average?

Tonight will be the night if it does. The last truly pro-Trump sample will come off of the average tonight.

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Nate Cohn pointed out that it looks like this pollster is weighting it's results to conform to 2012's 51-47 Presidential outcome, which partly explains the big Republican slant since some people in most polls tend to say they voted for the winner when they did not.

This pollster is using the same modeling that RAND used in 2012 when they nailed the election with pretty good accuracy. This is a test to see if it they were just lucky or good. One would assume the same "voted for the winner" in 2008 bias for the 2012 cycle.

Obviously, the jury is still out on this type of polling, generally.

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With the trendline changes. Pretty much a wash.

USC/LA Times national tracking poll (through 8/4)
Clinton: 45.2 (+0.4)
Trump: 44.6 (-0.4)

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USC/LA Times national tracking poll (through 8/5)
Clinton: 44.6 (-0.6%)
Trump: 44.2 (-0.4%)

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USC/LA Times national tracking poll (through 8/6)
Clinton: 44.7 (+0.1%)
Trump: 44.0 (-0.2%)

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USC/LA Times national tracking poll (through 8/7)
Clinton: 45.0 (+0.3%)
Trump: 43.8 (-0.2%)

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USC/LA Times national tracking poll (through 8/8)
Clinton: 45.1 (+0.1%)
Trump: 43.4 (-0.4%)

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USC/LA Times national tracking poll (through 8/9)
Clinton: 44.9 (-0.2%)
Trump: 43.5 (+0.1%)

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USC/LA Times national tracking poll (through 8/10)
Clinton: 44.8 (-0.1%)
Trump: 43.3 (-0.2%)

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USC/LA Times national tracking poll (through 8/11) Clinton +1.1%
Clinton: 44.2 (-0.6%)
Trump: 43.1 (-0.2%)

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Either Clinton had a good day or this thing is finally realigning to where the other polls are.

USC/LA Times national tracking poll (through 8/12) Clinton +3.5%
Clinton: 45.7% (+1.5%)
Trump: 42.2% (-0.9%)

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USC/LA Times national tracking poll (through 8/13) Clinton +4.7%
Clinton: 46.3% (+0.6%)
Trump: 41.6% (-0.6%)

Seems like they are adding voters to the sample. Sample size was ~2,200. It's now ~2,300.

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USC/LA Times national tracking poll (through 8/14) Clinton +3.6%
Clinton: 45.6% (-0.7%)
Trump: 42.0% (+0.4%)

Sample size went up from 2,325 to 2,510 from Saturday to Sunday's sample.

Sample was in the 2,100 range earlier in the week. I think eventually, they want this poll to be ~400 to 500 voters a day. (7-day average)

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USC/LA Times national tracking poll (through 8/15) Clinton +3.4%
Clinton: 45.5% (-0.1%)
Trump: 42.1% (+0.1%)

Sample size increase seemed to slow on Monday. Up marginally from 2,510 to 2,539.

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USC/LA Times national tracking poll (through 8/16) Clinton +1.0%
Clinton: 44.2% (-1.3%)
Trump: 43.2% (+1.1%)

A good day for Trump.

Sample size increase up marginally from 2,539 to 2,551.

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USC/LA Times national tracking poll (through 8/17) Clinton +0.6%
Clinton: 44.0% (-0.2%)
Trump: 43.4% (+0.2%)

Sample size fell from 2,551 to 2,500.

Voter intensity has closed to 82.3 Clinton vs. 82.1 Trump.  Trump's numbers have rebounded from 78.8 earlier in the week.

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USC/LA Times national tracking poll (through 8/18) Clinton +1.2%
Clinton: 44.6% (+0.6%)
Trump: 43.4% (--%)