GOP-friendly pollster shows Trump losing to Biden by 10 points

One of the nation’s most reliably GOP-leaning pollsters on Wednesday released the results of its first weekly poll for the 2020 presidential election. They showed Joe Biden leading Donald Trump.

The Rasmussen Reports survey of 5,000 “likely voters,” conducted July 5-7, found that 50% support Joe Biden, 40% support Donald Trump, and 6% are undecided.

Among Republicans, Trump had just 74% support, compared to 79% support for Biden among Democrats. Trump has often claimed to have a 95% approval rating among members of his party.

Polling analysts have noted that Rasmussen has had a distinctly pro-Republican bias.

“For Rasmussen … the Republican lean in its polls ran pretty much wire to wire,” wrote Nate Silver on his website FiveThirtyEight after the 2016 election. “It had a significant Republican house effect early in the election cycle and a significant Republican house effect late in the election, and it would up turning into a significant Republican bias on Election Day.”

Ipsos Public Affairs research director Mallory Newall told Hill.TV in 2018 that the way Rasmussen adjusts its data, based on party identification, tends “to be more along the partisan angle, leaning toward the Republicans.”

Trump himself has repeatedly praised Rasmussen as “accurate.” In a tweet in April 2018, he thanked Rasmussen for its “honest polling” after the firm showed him with a 50% approval rating.

Last month, Trump threatened to sue CNN after it released a national poll showing Biden with a 14-point lead among registered voters.

He baselessly tweeted that the network’s polls “are as Fake as their Reporting,” and his campaign claimed the numbers were “designed to mislead American voters through a biased questionnaire and skewed sampling.”

CNN stood by its polling.

Trump claimed last week that he is “getting VERY GOOD internal Polling Numbers” but has not released them.

The Trump campaign did not immediately respond to an inquiry for this story.

Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.