Monmouth University Polling Institute admitted Wednesday that it's most recent Democratic primary poll appears to be an outlier.
The poll quickly gained attention when it was released Monday because the results were a far cry from previous polls done by both Monmouth and other polling organizations. Specifically, it showed the frontrunner, former Vice President Joe Biden, falling 13 percent to a statistical tie with Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.
"It occurs very infrequently, but every pollster who has been in this business a while recognizes that outliers happen. This appears to be one of those instances," Patrick Murray, director of the institute wrote in a statement on Wednesday.
The poll was notable because it was one of the final polls the Democratic Party used to determine which candidates will qualify to take the stage during the party's third debate in early September. Biden, Sanders, and Warren have already met the requirements.
On Tuesday, before Monmouth announced that the poll may not be the best indicator of public opinion, Murray told Cheddar that Democratic-leaning voters might be "second guessing" the former vice president.
"Voters are now searching for: who do I think is the best candidate for me, for the issues that I stand for, and also, for beating Donald Trump. Maybe they're second guessing Joe Biden," Murray said.
On Wednesday, after the poll was deemed an outlier, Murray issued a statement to Cheddar that still indicated his belief that Biden is largely finding success because of his name recognition.
"While the horse race results of our poll are different from other national polls, the underlying dynamics of the race remain that a large proportion of Biden's support is based on name recognition and perceptions of electability," he said.
Murray added: "Voters are starting to tune in and may cast about. They could end up sticking with Biden in the end, but it remains a sign that his support is based on a different set of priorities than it is for voters who back other candidates."
The Monmouth poll released Monday was based on 298 registered voters who identified as Democrats or lean toward the Democratic party, with a +/- 5.7 percent point margin of error.
On Wednesday, another set of DNC-approved qualifying polls were released. Both the USA Today/Suffolk University poll and Quinnipiac University poll show Joe Biden in the lead at 32 percent with Warren and Sanders in second and third by significant margins.
Biden's Deputy Campaign Manager and Communications Director Kate Bedingfield told MSNBC Tuesday, "He is leading in the polls, to be clear."
The school shooting in Texas that left 19 children and 2 teachers dead has reignited the debate over gun control.
The tragedy in Uvalde is the deadliest school shooting in nearly a decade and marks the latest in a string of mass shootings in the country. Jared Moskowitz, Broward County Commissioner and candidate for Congress in FL-23, joined Cheddar's Opening Bell to discuss why gun control measures are stalled in the Senate, and where legislation can move forward from here.
Police and detectives are still investigating the tragic school shooting in Uvalde, Texas that killed 19 children and two adults. Cheddar News was joined by Kirk Burkhalter, professor at New York Law School and former NYPD detective to gain some insight on what investigators are looking for and what comes next.
Texas authorities say the gunman who massacred 21 people at an elementary school was in the building for over an hour before he was killed by law enforcement officers.
Join Cheddar News as we break down the top headlines for Thursday, May 26 including updates on the Texas school shooting, President Joe Biden's executive order on police reform, and a recount in the Pennsylvania GOP Senate primary.
Representative Morgan Griffith of Virginia rebuked words from the FDA commissioner that could have been construed as blaming parents for stockpiling baby formula exacerbating the shortage.
Cheddar News reporter Megan Pratz brings the latest from the scene of yesterday's horrific school shooting at a Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas. Now the second-deadliest school shooting in U.S. history with 19 children and two adults killed, Pratz goes into comments by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, details about the deceased shooter, and reactions from members of the community.
The Robb Elementary School mass shooting killing 19 children and two adults in Uvalde, Texas pm Tuesday was the deadliest school shooting since the 2012 Sandy Hook massacre in Newtown, Connecticut, and came just 10 days after the grocery store shooting in Buffalo, New York. Nelson Vergara, the founder and CEO of 360 Protective Solutions, joined Cheddar’s Opening Bell to discuss. "Right now what law enforcement is concentrating on is trying to trace his steps as to what motivated the gunman to act the way he did. What it boils down to just trying to figure out what led to his motivation to do such a horrific act.”
An recently conducted AP-NORC poll found that majorities of the Black and Hispanic populations in the U.S. still find themselves either somewhat worried or extremely worried over the pandemic, while more than half of white Americans responded with either being not too worried or not worried at all. Dr. Chris Pernell, the chief strategic integration and health equity officer at University Hospital, joined Cheddar News to talk about how perceptions of COVID-19 differ between groups of Americans. "We’re still seeing people get infected, and because of the toll of the disproportionate impact, we have concerns among the Black and brown community about whether or not they have an increased risk of exposure because of where they work, because of the use of public transportation, because they live in homes that they may not be able to safely quarantine and or isolate in, and because they have at baseline chronic health conditions that may make coronavirus more severe in those persons," she said.
Judith Enck, a former regional administrator for the EPA and the president of Beyond Plastics, joined Cheddar News to talk about the role of plastics in the climate crisis and California's investigation of ExxonMobil and other oil companies for misleading the public on the ability to recycle plastics. "The reason why petrochemical companies like Exxon have gotten away with selling more and more plastic is that they've lied to the public and told us don't worry about all those negative upstream impacts and downstream impacts of plastics. Just be sure to recycle it. Well, guess what? Plastics largely are not recycled," Enck said.
