Election 2026

Pollsters Do Their Autopsy

Plus: Eggs on ice, Chicago's teachers unions, and more...

Liz Wolfe | 8.13.2026 9:30 AM

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A word from the pollsters: In the most recent round of primary results, polls basically indicated that Francesca Hong had the Wisconsin gubernatorial primary on lock, when she did not (as we learned yesterday). Other polls had indicated that Abdul El-Sayed, a far-left progressive running in Michigan's Democratic Senate primary, might not do so well—but he managed a victory last week. So what's going on here?

I am calling for a total and complete shutdown of primary polling in the Midwestern United States until we can figure out what the hell is going on. https://t.co/Wm6TwTuaUG

— Frank Luntz (@FrankLuntz) August 12, 2026

One possible explanation, per The New York Times: "Hong faced a barrage of negative press in the election's final days, after six-year-old social media posts surfaced in which she called to defund and abolish the police and 'cancel Thanksgiving.'" It's almost like words have meaning, and more moderate voters didn't absolutely love Woke 1.0. But polls being kinda wrong about both Hong and El-Sayed can't just be about that.

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It's possible that open primaries made a difference—Republicans and independents got to have their say in the Democratic primary, and a candidate as radical as Hong freaked them out and mobilized them to turn out. There appears to have been fewer young people voting than Team Hong hoped for, so that possibly........

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