2020 polling

Trump dismisses 2020 polling that show him in danger

By CAITLIN OPRYSKO

President Donald Trump is reviving his attacks on the polling industry, denying reports that his own internal polling has indicated trouble ahead for his reelection bid, even as public polls show warning signs.

In a pair of tweets Tuesday, Trump cheered the power social media gives him to “fight back” against media outlets, writing that “Their new weapon of choice is Fake Polling, sometimes referred to as Suppression Polls (they suppress the numbers).”

“The Fake (Corrupt) News Media said they had a leak into polling done by my campaign,” he said, likely referring to a New York Times story detailing Trump’s response to a “devastating" 17-state poll conducted by his internal pollster. According to the Times, after being briefed on the poll, Trump asked aides to deny that he was trailing former Vice President Joe Biden in several key states. When the toplines of Trump’s internal polls leaked, he reportedly then asked advisers to “say publicly that other data showed him doing well.”

But Trump pushed back on the story, claiming that despite the flurry of investigations dogging him, his internal polls “are the best numbers WE have ever had.”

“They reported Fake numbers that they made up & don’t even exist. WE WILL WIN AGAIN!” he added.

Referring to his 2016 attacks on pollsters, Trump also said that a current spate of polls that have shown him losing in head-to-head match-ups with any number of the top 2020 Democratic contenders “is worse” than 2016.

The latest damaging numbers came Tuesday, in a national Quinnipiac poll that showed Trump losing to six 2020 Democrats by as few as five points to as many as 13. In the last several weeks, polls have shown the president trailing in two other states key to his 2016 election: Michigan and Pennsylvania. One Quinnipiac poll last week even showed Biden topping Trump in the GOP stronghold of Texas.

But while the president insisted there's no cause for alarm, his campaign has begun scrambling to shore up his standing in the Rust Belt and even eyed blue states in an effort to expand Trump's path to victory in 2020.