How pollsters are modernizing

Plus: The end of Title 42, an outlier poll, a look at House rematches, and the Four Addictions

No. 266 | May 5th, 2023

📊  Polling & Public Attitudes

Nate Cohn: ​​Two Schools of Polling Are Converging: Reflecting on a Tumultuous Decade (The New York Times 🔒)

“It’s been nearly a decade since I first attended the annual conference of pollsters, known as AAPOR.

Back then, it was a very different place. It was dominated by traditional pollsters who knew change was inevitable but who appeared uncomfortable with the sacrifices required to accommodate new people, methods and ideas.

At the time, that gathering reminded me of the Republican Party, which was then grappling with how to deal with demographic change and Hispanic voters in the wake of Barack Obama’s re-election. There are obvious differences, but the AAPOR crowd’s talk about reaching out to new groups and ideas was animated by similar senses of threat that the Republicans were facing then — the concern posed by long-term trends, the status threat from newcomers, and the sense that traditional values would be threatened by accomm…