Newsmax loves the biased polls right-wing pollsters Jim and John McLaughlin crank out, and it loves even more when they peddle their polling work on TV. Some recent examples:
- Jim McLaughlin to Newsmax: Trump Endorsement Almost Always Produces Winner
- John McLaughlin to Newsmax: ‘Really Tight’ Races in Calif.
- Jim McLaughlin to Newsmax: Dems Have No Strong 2028 Candidate
- McLaughlin to Newsmax: Democrats May Flee Maine Nominee Platner
The McLaughlins spent a May 8 column being in denial about President Trump’s plummeting favorability ratings:
For months, the mainstream media has pushed a familiar narrative: President Donald Trump is supposedly slipping in the polls, Republicans are vulnerable, and the political environment is turning against the America First movement.
But once again, the polling industry’s credibility problem is becoming impossible to ignore.
The latest example is the Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll conducted April 24-28 among 2,560 U.S. adults. Not registered voters. Not likely voters. Only adults.
That distinction matters enormously — especially when the poll is being used to shape narratives about the 2026 midterm elections.
The most glaring problem with this survey is buried deep in its methodology section on page 29. According to the sample, only 29% of respondents said they voted for Donald Trump in 2024.
That is not remotely close to reality.
Donald Trump won roughly 50% of the popular vote in 2024. Yet this poll underrepresents Trump voters by more than 20 points.
[…]What the media consistently misses is intensity.
Trump voters are not casual participants.
They are highly motivated, highly engaged, and far more likely to turn out than the disengaged “adult” respondents who dominate many national media surveys.
That is why likely voter models matter. That is why voter history matters.
And that is why reputable campaign polling relies heavily on validated voter files — not generic online panels detached from real electoral behavior.
This was followed by a June 24 TV appearance in similar denial:
President Donald Trump has a 50% favorability rating, according to the latest political survey by pollster John McLaughlin, who told Newsmax on Wednesday that the poll measured voter sentiment toward the president.
“What’s going on is President Trump succeeding,” McLaughlin told “Ed Henry: The Big Take.”
“You’re seeing that the Democrats realize that Trump has built the Republican Party into a working-class party, represents American values. And he’s succeeding.”
McLaughlin said Democrats lack a unifying message comparable to Trump’s “Make America Great Again” slogan.
“They’re trying to stop us from having a growing economy. They want to raise taxes,” he said.
“They want bigger government. These are big-government socialists,” McLaughlin continued. “They don’t share our values.”
It wasn’t disclosed that the McLaughlins worked as Trump’s campaign pollster, which accounts for this overly rosy analysis. It was also not detailed from where, exactly, McLaughlin got his numbers.