Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Republican presidential candidate Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) said that the news media is being misled by the polls when it comes to his opponent Donald Trump.
Host Chuck Todd asked, “You know you started this race as one of the front-runners. A lot of people thought you were going to be one of the front-runners at this point in time. You’re not there. That doesn’t mean you won’t be at some point. But are you frustrated with how this campaign has turned out? The focus on Trump? What is it that is — I feel the frustration in reading your tweets. You clearly are. Can you put it into words?”
Paul said, “Yeah, the interesting thing is, is that I think the polls are not scientific. A lot of people who follow polls never had any math classes. They don’t understand anything about standard error, standard deviation … And the problem is, is that they’ve been way wrong. I mean, look, we just had polling in the Kentucky race and a week before when they’re supposed to be most accurate they’re off 13 points. If I do have a frustration we’re being led by the nose and the news media is led by the nose to think somehow Trump is going to win this because of these polls. The polls don’t, I believe, capture who’s going to actually vote. We have great popularity with students. I had 1,000 students at George Washington a few weeks ago. 1,000 students at Iowa state. and the thing is, have you ever met a college student that has answered a presidential poll? If we turn them out we’re going to shock people like you’ve never seen. But the problem is, is that it’s a self-fulfilling cycle. Really in the end nobody knows and we ought to have a little bit more of an even approach to how we approach the news.”
Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN
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