Will the Liberal Pollsters Be Wrong… Again?

Oct 22, 2026
Hayden Ludwig
America First | Permanent Campaign

Don't panic about a "blue wave" in November. Read this—then go vote.

Liberal talking heads are already frothing about a blue wave in November. Once again, we're being told Republicans are doomed, Democrats are unstoppable, and conservatives should prepare for political exile.

Sound familiar?

Before panicking, take a breath. We've seen this show before. Polls miss the mark, media narratives outpace reality, and the public is left wondering why that inevitable Democratic victory never materialized. But the reasons why may surprise you.

Restoration News spoke with two conservative polling experts to cut through the fake news noise and explain what Americans should actually watch heading into the November 3 election. Here's what you need to know.

Point 1: Election Day still matters. A lot.

Early voting is not a crystal ball. In several key states, most voters will likely cast their ballots on Election Day itself.

Based on past turnout and their analysis of the evolving electorate, Restoration of America's (ROA) data experts estimate that Election Day voting will account for approximately 58 percent of all Republican votes cast in Michigan, 74 percent in Minnesota, 68 percent in Maine, 43 percent in North Carolina, and 40 percent in Georgia.

Wisconsin is harder to predict, with estimates ranging from 55 to 72 percent of the vote coming on Election Day. That doesn't tell us who will win, but it does suggest that interpreting early voting numbers requires more than looking at raw totals and declaring a winner.

Republicans demonstrated this in Wisconsin. In 2020, Joe Biden entered Election Day with a 600,000 early vote lead and won the Badger State by just 20,700 votes. Republicans noticed that squeaker… and got smart about early voting.

Fast forward to 2024, and Kamala Harris entered Election Day with a 200,000 early vote lead—and Donald Trump took Wisconsin by 29,600 votes.

What changed? Republicans focused their efforts on voter registration, mobilization, and early voting—the pillars of the permanent campaign—and cut Democrats' early vote lead by an astonishing two-thirds.

None of these projections is a guarantee. They're estimates built on models. But they illustrate a basic point: the election isn't over until the votes are counted. So don't let a headline about early voting leads convince you that your vote won't matter. It will.

Go vote.

Point 2: The media confuses gambling with polling.

Everyone knows that Polymarket and other prediction markets aren't traditional polls.

Or at least, they should.

Let's state the obvious: an election poll attempts to measure the opinions of a sample of voters. A prediction market measures how online gamblers think those voters will vote. They're different data points. So why are they so often conflated?

Major TV news outlets such as CNN, Fox News, and CNBC have increasingly featured prediction market betting odds alongside—or in place of—traditional polling results.

How easy is it to mistake gambling results for a political survey? Very—according to the far-left Brennan Center, whose recent study suggests Polymarket betting averages may be influencing how voters perceive candidates' chances in a given race. The stakes are enormous. Gamblers have already bet $220 million (and counting) on 2026 midterm election outcomes.

If voters repeatedly hear that their candidate is a long shot, they may begin to believe victory is impossible—and stay home. That creates a vicious cycle in which a narrative about an election influences the very electorate whose behavior it's meant to predict.

Don't let online gambling shape your opinion. Go vote.

Are you registered to vote? How about your friends and family? Find out at www.ChristianActivation.com today. Don't wait.

Point 3: There are polls—and then there are push polls.

As RealClearPolitics polling analyst Sean Trende has explained, the growth of early voting since 2020 has wrecked pre-election analysis.

"If you know these four quantities (number of early votes, number of Election Day votes, Party A’s share of early votes, Party A’s share of Election Day votes), you can figure out the election result," he writes. "Here’s the rub: Early voting gives us only one of those quantities, and only after early voting wraps up."

In other words, ROA political strategist John Pearman told Restoration News, "early voting and polling are incompatible."

"Look, too many people think polling is an FDA-certified science. It's not. Pollsters and polling are unregulated, unreliable, and unaccountable," he added. "And every industry insider knows it."

Pearman points out that long early voting periods—such as the 45 days offered by Virginia—can discourage voters from turning out if they believe a race is out of reach. "That's the beauty of Election Day," he explained. "It lets people make up their mind—once. As a country, we should move back toward Election Day and away from election month, and you'll see more accurate polls."

Since the industry's mega-flop in the 2016 presidential election, Republican voters have become suspicious of any and all polls, and for good reason: they often severely undercount Republican voters.

"If there's anything about the Trump era that we know, it's that polling often undercounts these Republican Trump voters" in states where Republicans end up winning by double digits, Today show host Savannah Guthrie admitted on October 20. That includes Democrats' must-win Senate races in Michigan and Minnesota, which are "showing pretty tight races as well."

Recall that polling over the summer showed Abdul El-Sayed winning the Michigan Democratic gubernatorial primary by 15 percentage points. He actually won by a single point.

But that doesn't mean all polls are wrong, says League of American Workers Founder Steve Cortes.

"Trump's 2016 upset was a very notable miss. However, well-constructed polling averages, over time, are generally reliable for finding out where our voters are at the moment," he told Restoration News. "As a senior advisor to both Trump and Vance, I paid incredibly close attention to polls that had good track records and were transparent about their approach and provided full crosstabs of data."

Cortes cautions about "leading" or "push" polls that can be used to shift the political "center" on issues. "Now that I am directing polling ... I pay extremely close attention to writing questions as objectively as possible and forming the expected electorate using math and probability, not narrative and bias."

He points to the League of American Workers' track record, "getting 6 of the 7 swing states in 2024 correct, and almost to the decimal point."

"Polling is both an art and a science," he added. "So, it is entirely possible that even normally dependable polls will miss how the electorate is shifting in 2016—and we end up with a repeat of 2016."

All of which makes it easier for an unscrupulous pollster to push fake polling—and an extraordinary case shows how easy it can be in 2026.

Point 4: It's easier than ever to separate the liars from the pollsters.

Ever heard of Wedgewood Polls?

Probably not. But they should be on everyone's radar—because this obscure surveyor just pulled the greatest "con" in the industry's history. Time to celebrate.

On October 20, Wedgewood admitted that it had fabricated most of its 2026 polling data. Those "results" were hoovered up by numerous "credible" polling outlets—think New York Times, Fox News' Decision Desk HQ, MS NOW, FiftyPlusOne, and polling "guru" Nate Silver's Silver Bulletin—to show Democratic candidates were soaring past Republicans in key races.

That's not an exaggeration. Take it from Wedgewood itself.

This was an "experimental project to demonstrate the vulnerabilities, lack of oversight, and overall low barrier to entry in the modern political polling industry," the company wrote. "We wanted to test a simple hypothesis: How easy is it for an entirely fabricated polling firm to gain traction, be taken seriously, and expose how little scrutinization exists in media and public commentary?

"The short answer: Far too easy."

Despite having no history, formal credentials, or real data behind the vast majority of our releases, Wedgewood Polling was added to major polling aggregators, including The New York Times, FiftyPlusOne, and VoteHub, and repeatedly used as a legitimate data source. Our fabricated numbers were given instant credibility across national media platforms—including being cited on air and in reporting by outlets such as MS NOW.

What Wedgewood proved is that the top liberal pollsters like Nate Silver claiming near-infallibility are fools at best—and deceivers at worst. They're more interested in pushing a narrative that helps elect Democrats than telling the truth.

To be clear, Wedgewood says its goal was not to mislead the public or sway elections, but rather to reveal "a systemic breakdown in media vetting and data aggregation."

Notably, Silver's forecast immediately shifted toward Republicans after removing Wedgewood's fake polls.

Cortes says the whole episode is "revealing."

"I think it's notable that my League of American Workers polls are included in the RealClearPolitics averages [of other polls], but not in the Nate Silver or New York Times averages," he said. "For the phony Wedgewood scam polls, though, the exact inverse was true. Pretty telling, really."

Nor is this the first time a firm's polls were revealed as fake. In August, another fake pollster—Median Strategies—admitted it had fabricated bogus polls showing socialist Francesca Hong had a 23-point lead over her opponent David Crowley in the Wisconsin Democratic gubernatorial primary. Crowley ended up winning by half a percentage point in the August election.

Here's the kicker: in its coverage of the scandal, the New York Times included this haughty line: "None of the polls above were included in The New York Times’s poll trackers or coverage because they did not meet its basic transparency and professionalism standards."

Basic standards, indeed.

Go vote.

Polls Don't Win Races. Voters Do.

So, will the liberal pollsters be wrong again? Count on it. Then turn your ballot in early or on Election Day.

There's nothing foreordained about a "blue wave" (or a red one, for that matter). There are enough conservatives and right-leaning moderates in this country to send Democrats into political oblivion for a generation—if they show up. Heck, there are enough faithful Christians to build an unstoppable Republican majority for decades, if they'd only act on their faith and vote.

Think about that. Tens of millions of people who imagine their votes don't count.

Talk about a silent majority.

Get signed up to vote and take back our country at www.ChristianActivation.com today. 

Don't wait.

MORE FROM RESTORATION NEWS:

Conservatives, Change the Narrative On 'Affordability' to Win. Here's How

Seth Keshel: This is the GOP's Path to Victory in the 2026 Midterms (INTERVIEW)

The Permanent Campaign is Paying Off in Pennsylvania—Why It Matters

Trump Can Unlock a Massive MAGA Majority, But He Must Act Swiftly

Good News: We All Win When Christians Like You Turn Out and Vote

Hayden Ludwig is Founder and Executive Editor of Restoration News, launched in 2023 by Restoration of America. As a writer he specializes in election integrity and dark money, authoring the first investigations into the 2020 election "Zuck Bucks" scandal and unearthing the world's largest dark money network run by Arabella Advisors. He publishes regularly at RealClearPolitics, American Greatness, the American Spectator, and the American Conservative. Hayden is also a member of the board of directors at the National Legal and Policy Center in Washington, D.C.

Email Hayden HERE

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