We're not talking about an established candidate with pre-existing support, and this was just the first leg of the election with multiple presidential candidates, not the run-off, so don't compare this to Trump v Kamala.

I'm also not talking about a single poll, or ones run by just the left/right, he wasn't polling well anywhere.

I don't have knowledge about the polls but someone made a good point elesewhere. His share of the vote might have increased after the Constitutional Court banned another (far right) candidate because they didn't like her discourse (crazy, right?) https://tvpworld.com/82727489/romanian-pm-suggests-constitut... Rather ironic that the PM criticized that decision while praising the court for this latest intrusion.

You mean Harris +3 in Iowa.

But yes, I agree that a 17-point miss by "the gold standard of Iowa polling" is almost inexplicable unless it was done as a last-minute act to persuade marginal voters to vote for Harris. (Selzer herself says that she thinks the poll's result motivated Trump voters, the preposterousness of which is all the more indication that she intentionally skewed the result.)

am I understanding correctly that you're suggesting that an Iowa poll was artificially made to favour Harris in order to get more people to vote for her?

Yes. People naturally like to vote for winners, and those who look like winners.

There was *massive* news coverage of the Selzer poll's surprising result, with accompanying breathless commentary discussing how this was proof that hordes of Republican women were indeed secretly[1] voting for Kamala. Cue the tens of thousands of Redditards' comments on how Harris would surely win not just Iowa but Texas, Florida, Ohio, etc.

Governor Pritzker of Illinois told an audience at Duke of the poll before its release. In other words, it was leaked to those who would be pleased by the findings. <https://www.semafor.com/article/11/10/2024/gannett-probes-po...>

[1] For example, the Julia Roberts-starring TV ad <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FaCPck2qDhk> showing how women could and should secretly vote for Harris and not tell their horrible husbands.

(Beware; the cringe level is so overwhelming that if your brain doesn't shut down in self-defense your computer might explode. There is a reason why the ad is not linked directly anywhere on Reddit except a handful of posts with a half dozen comments. If Redditors saw it as truly "stunning" and "brave", it would have been reposted 100 times, each time with 20K upvotes and 3.5K comments.)

do you have a source saying that voters are more likely to vote for a candidate who polls higher?

... and to keep donations coming in. It helped cultivate a sense of hope when they needed it.

This is different. He was basically unknown, last visible in politics in 1996 or so. He isn't a member of any big party and by that I don't mean just the mainstream ones, but like, the top 10 parties in the country.

He's a nobody.

Like that, your defense of bad polling is that only the people who control the polls should have a say in who is elected.

“He’s a nobody!” means “He isn’t supported by our media and elites and corporations”

Have you ever considered that is the reason he did well?