An NBC News and Wall Street Journal poll results were just released Thursday. This was one of the qualifying polls for the September debates.
In order to qualify for the September debates, the Democrats raised the stakes and decided that candidates must poll at 2 percent or higher in four qualifying polls and receive 130,000 donations from unique donors. The only candidates to get at least two percent in the NBC/WSJ poll just released are the following:
- Former Vice President Joe Biden
- Sen. Elizabeth Warren
- Sen. Kamala Harris
- Sen. Bernie Sanders
- Mayor Pete Buttigieg
- Beto O’Rourke
- Andrew Yang
This poll consisted originally of 800 registered voters, but in order to get to a bare minimum selection size of n=400 when polling Democrats alone, they had to also include another 122 Democratic Primary voters. So, in the first batch of 800 people polled, only 278 of them were Democrats.
Interview of Registered Voters
This is a qualifying poll, but unfortunately, the demographics of those interviewed don’t match up with the demographics of the electorate that is expected in 2020.
Racial Demographics
When Pew Research looked at the anticipated 2020 electorate, it found that 66.7 percent of the electorate is likely going to be white. Yet in the NBC/WSJ poll, a full 75 percent of registered voters interviewed were white.
When Pew Research looked at the anticipated 2020 electorate, it found that 12.5 percent of the electorate is likely to be black. The NBC/WSJ poll was almost accurate in this demographic because this demographic represents 12 percent of those polled for the NBC/WSJ poll.
When Pew Research looked at the anticipated 2020 electorate, it found that 4.7 percent of the 2020 electorate will likely be Asian, but in the NBC/WSJ poll, this demographic only accounted for 2 percent of the interviews of registered voters.
When Pew Research looked at the anticipated 2020 electorate, it found that 13.3 percent of the 2020 electorate will likely be Hispanic. Meanwhile in the NBC/WSJ poll, this demographic only accounted for 5 percent of the registered voters interviewed.
Employment Demographics
Professional, management and white collared workers amount to 40 percent of the real workforce. In this poll though, they amount to 73 percent of those employed.
That’s not even the most interesting thing about the NBC/WSJ survey though. To learn how a mere eight people could have landed candidates like Rep. Tulsi Gabbard and Corey Booker a qualifying poll under their belts, read the second part of the NBC/WSJ survey analysis.
Finch & Eagle 