Election Deniers Think the GOP’s Terrible Midterm Polling Is a ‘Psyop’
Conservative figures and election deniers are dismissing unfavorable midterm polling as 'psyops' or fake operations designed to suppress Republican turnout. Despite these claims, internal GOP concerns suggest genuine anxiety regarding the party's performance in upcoming federal elections.
Why it matters
The rejection of polling data by political factions reflects a broader trend of eroding trust in institutional data and the normalization of election denialism in US politics.
Kevin Roberts, president of the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, told Fox News that midterm election polling is a “psyop…to depress conservative turnout.”
“The midterms are near,” Phillip Buchanan, the election denier and MAGA troll known online as Catturd, wrote to his four million followers on X. “The laughable fake polls are rolling out.”
For over a decade, Trump has claimed without evidence that American elections have been impacted by fraud. In the wake of his loss in 2020, an entire online community and ecosystem of election denial groups sprung up to push the baseless allegation that former president Joe Biden stole the election from Trump. These claims have become central to the Republican Party’s belief system, to the point where hundreds of GOP candidates for federal and statewide elections in November have expressed doubts about the integrity of US elections.
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