Dan McLaughlin of National Review Online explores one pro-Republican pollster’s recent findings.
It’s a question we seem to ask every election season: Is Trafalgar seeing something nobody else is, or is it seeing something that isn’t there? The right-leaning polling firm run by Robert Cahaly made its reputation in 2016 by its ability to find Republican voters — especially the sorts of voters most favorable to Donald Trump — that other pollsters missed. Trafalgar has not had a spotless record, and its periodic failures have tended in the direction of overestimating Republicans. …
… The question arises again from two polls suggesting particular optimism for deep-blue-state Republicans. One is a poll from Washington State showing challenger Tiffany Smiley down by just three points, 49 percent to 46 percent, to five-term incumbent Patty Murray. The last two polls in the race, taken in July, showed Murray up by 18 and 20 points, respectively. The other is a poll from New York, done in conjunction with Insider Advantage, showing Congressman Lee Zeldin trailing Governor Kathy Hochul by five points, 49 percent to 43 percent. The previous three polls showed Hochul up 14, 16, and 24 points, respectively. In a good Republican environment, both Smiley and Zeldin are in position to make a winning move down the stretch run if their current position is where Trafalgar has them; if they are really down by high double-digit margins, they are already toast. …
… There are different cases to be made for what might be happening in these states. The optimistic case for Republicans is the national case (the undertow of Biden’s unpopularity, a difficult economy, and Democrats poorly positioned on culture-tinged issues such as crime and education) plus the particular problems of crime, disorder, and leftist insanity locally in each state. The pessimistic case is that abortion in particular will make it harder for deep-blue-state Republicans to capitalize on those factors. …