ANALYSIS: 57% disapprove of Trump but…

A new Morning Consult-Politico poll shows high disapproval numbers for the job President Trump is doing.

Fifty-seven percent (57%) of registered voters surveyed disapprove of Trump. Only thirty-nine percent (39%) approve.

However, poll reporting often lacks important context: Who was surveyed.

In this case, significantly more Democrats than Republicans are represented in the Morning Consult-Politico poll. Without this context, readers may draw misleading conclusions.

Furthermore, the reported demographic sample of this tracking poll has changed significantly in recent months.

Here are a few details that can be found in the data from the poll:

Democrats are more heavily represented.

• 742 Democrats (37%)
• 600 Republicans (30%)
• 142 more Democrats than Republicans
• 7 percentage points more Democrats than Republicans

Women are more heavily represented.

• 932 men (47%)
• 1060 women (53%)
• 128 more women than men
• 6 percentage points more women than men

Obama supporters are far more heavily represented.

Those surveyed voted heavily for Democrat Barack Obama over Republican Mitt Romney for President in 2012.

• 43% voted for Obama
• 26% voted for Romney.
• In other words, they leaned toward Obama by a factor of about 17 percentage points.

That 17 percentage point difference closely mirrors the 18 percentage point pro- vs. anti-Trump vote.

The Morning Consult-Politico poll is a “national tracking” poll. Tracking polls typically interview the same people over time. Because of that, they often can accurately detecting trends even if the sample is potentially skewed.

In this instance, demographics of the national tracking sample has changed significantly. That implies different people were interviewed (which would make trends less reliable) or that the data was “weighted” in the arcane and somewhat mysterious ways that data is often weighted in polls to reportedly make the results more accurately reflect the population at large. The poll notes: “All statistics are calculated with demographic post-stratification weights applied.”

The same poll reported quite a different sample in April when compared to January 2019.

There are significantly more Democrats in the newer poll that shows lower numbers for Trump.

–analysis of Morning Consult-Politico poll by SharylAttkisson.com

43 more Democrats in new, April survey (699 in Jan.; 742 in April)

• 30 more Democrat men in April survey (266 Dem. men in Jan.; 296 Dem. men in April)
• 13 more Democrat women in April survey (433 Dem. women in Jan.; 446 Dem. women in April)

15 more Independents in new, April survey (634 Ind. in Jan.; 649 Ind. in April)

• 47 fewer Independent men in April survey (356 Ind. men in Jan.; 309 Ind. men in April)
• 62 more Independent women in April survey (278 Ind. women in Jan; 340 Ind. women in April)

55 or 56 fewer Republicans in new, April survey (656 in Jan.; 600 in April)

• 18 more Republican men in April survey (309 Rep. men in Jan.; 327 Rep. men in April)
• 73 fewer Republican women in April survey (347 Rep. women in Jan.; 274 Rep. women in April.

Read the Politico story on the poll here.

Read the poll data here.

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