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Opinion: Can Brian Kemp’s Derek Dooley gamble pay off?
The Georgia governor’s decision not to run for U.S. Senate and instead get behind the former University of Tennessee football coach has peeved his fellow Republicans.
House approves short-term extension of key surveillance law after dealing GOP leadership pair of floor defeats
The House agreed early Friday morning on a short-term extension of a critical foreign surveillance program after dealing Republican leadership a pair of embarrassing floor defeats on a longer-term reauthorization.
Minnesota up against the clock on Medicaid changes
Democrats and Republicans in the Minnesota Legislature say they need to either pass legislation or update existing rules soon to ensure that state programs comply with new requirements from the federal government.
House Votes to Extend Expiring Law on Warrantless Surveillance for 10 Days
The Senate would need to also approve the stopgap measure that passed the House early Friday. Libertarian-leaning House Republicans had balked at a long-term extension.
House rushes to overnight vote to renew key surveillance tool used by US spy agencies
House Republican leadership is rushing early Friday to renew a controversial surveillance program used by U.S. spy agencies | KNSS Radio
House rushes to overnight vote to renew key surveillance tool used by US spy agencies
House Republican leadership is rushing early Friday to renew a controversial surveillance program used by U.S. spy agencies | 97.3 The Sky
House rushes to overnight vote to renew key surveillance tool used by US spy agencies
House Republican leadership is rushing early Friday to renew a controversial surveillance program used by U.S. spy agencies | KMBZ
Here are the Republicans running for Congress in Ohio's 1st District
There's a crowded Republican primary this year of candidates hoping to unseat incumbent Cincinnati Democratic Rep. Greg Landsman.
Peltola posts massive campaign fundraising, but Republicans maintain cash advantage in Alaska congressional races
In the Senate race, Mary Peltola raised close to $9 million in funds, but has less cash on hand than Dan Sullivan.
House rejects effort to withdraw U.S. forces from Iran war as GOP lawmakers stick with Trump
The House rejected a resolution Thursday requiring President Donald Trump to withdraw U.S. forces from the war with Iran unless Congress authorizes military action. It was the latest such vote that fell short of passage as Republicans largely continue to support Trump's operation.
Republicans’ Anxiety Over Iran War Grows But Vote Against Curbing Trump’s Powers
GOP lawmakers want a quick to end to the fighting, but declined to vote to curb President Trump’s powers.
RFK Jr. takes lashing in first of several contentious health hearings
The health and human services secretary received a rare rebuke from a Republican lawmaker as he defended his — and Trump’s — handling of the agency.
Trump tries economic reset as Republicans fret over high gas prices
Trump is set to use a Thursday stop in Las Vegas to tout his tax and immigration bill that includes campaign promises tailored to court hourly and hospitality workers.
House Again Thwarts Bid to Halt Iran War Unless Congress Approves It
Republicans narrowly blocked a Democratic war powers resolution that would have prevented President Trump from continuing to wage war in Iran until he won authorization from Congress to do so.
Democrats relish big fundraising gains for Senate races favoring Republicans
While Democrats touted their totals, they offer only a snapshot of overall fundraising, as campaigns had until the end of the day Wednesday to file with the Federal Election Commission.
States rush to redraw U.S. House districts ahead of the November midterm elections
Redistricting usually happens once a decade, but President Donald Trump sparked a mid-decade redistricting battle last year while calling on Texas Republicans to redraw their districts for partisan advantage. California Democrats reciprocated, and other states soon followed.
New poll shakes up California governor race, debate stage
Editor’s note: This article was updated to correct the breakdown of Republican voters surveyed. Congressman Eric Swalwell’s abrupt departure from the race for California governor has upended the fi…
Talarico Leads a Democratic Cash Surge: 7 Takeaways From 2026 Filings
Democrats in key Senate races out-raised their Republican rivals, but super PACs on the right are poised to play a powerful role in the midterms, new campaign finance filings showed.
Iran war has some Republicans worried their chances of keeping the House are slipping away
The White House had long circled Tax Day as the unofficial start to a critical midterm campaign meant to highlight how much money the administration was putting back in voters’ pockets.
Ohio bill would raise tax on sports betting wagers
An Ohio Republican is proposing raising the sports betting tax to fund public stadiums and K-12 education.
Community, business leaders learn about economic growth during annual breakfast
There are many pieces in the healthy economy puzzle. Iowa Economic Development Authority (IEDA) Director Debi Durham spoke at the Marshalltown Area Chamber of Commerce Economic Outlook Breakfast on Wednesday morning and shared what should be done to help foster growth in local economies. Chamber President/CEO John Hall sat on the stage with Durham at […]
Can Trump and Republicans Get Back on Message on the Economy?
It’s Tax Day, but much of the country’s focus has been on an unpopular war.
In the House, Republican Plans Go Awry Amid Party Divides
Fresh off a two-week break, lawmakers returned to turmoil in the House, where legislation to reopen the Department of Homeland Security is stalled and the G.O.P. is struggling to keep its agenda on track.
Sen. Ron Johnson weighs in on Iran war, gas prices, Wisconsin state politics
The Republican senator joined WPR’s "Wisconsin Today" as Congress is back in Washington to tackle big issues.
Republicans waited months for Tax Day to showcase economic relief for voters. But will the Iran war overshadow those savings?
In group chats and meetings, Republicans are privately petrified the Iran war could cost them the midterms
Many Republican lawmakers and strategists told NBC News they worry the party has little to run on. “Right now, the voters don’t see a message or a strategy,” a Trump pollster said.
Paul Renner rolls out plan to eliminate homestead taxes, cut business taxes, provide relief for renters
The Republican candidate for Governor has an ambitious proposal.
FDA to weigh easing limits on unproven peptides favored by RFK Jr. and other MAHA figures
Peptides are unproven chemicals often pitched as way to build muscle, lose weight, look younger.
Republican Clay Fuller sworn in to take House seat formerly held by Marjorie Taylor Greene
Republican Rep. Clay Fuller of Georgia was sworn into office Tuesday after winning a special election to take the congressional seat formerly held by Marjorie Taylor Greene.
FDA to Weigh Easing Limits on Unproven Peptides Favored by RFK Jr. and Other MAHA Figures
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Food and Drug Administration will hold a meeting this summer to consider easing restrictions on more than a half dozen peptide injections, a group of unapproved therapies that have become popular among wellness influencers, fitness gurus and celebrities. The meeting ...
Trump recalls how Ginsburg’s death affected the Supreme Court as he discusses whether Alito should retire
President Donald Trump complimented Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito but when asked about him stepping down while Republicans are in control, he pointed to how Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death shifted the court.
Republicans struggle to highlight Trump’s cuts as Americans see little effect on Tax Day
Republicans had hoped that Trump’s 2025 tax cuts would be at the forefront of voters’ minds, but many have reportedly not noticed a difference
GOP faces rising political tides on Iran, affordability in midterm year
Republicans are facing an increasingly difficult political environment in a midterm election year where their majorities in the House and Senate are on the line. The Iran war has been a drag on Pre…
Gambling legislation proposed puts fee on sports wagers
A bill has been proposed by Republican State Senator Bill Blessing, based in the Cincinnati area, that would put a two percent fee on sports wagers.The bill is
Gambling legislation proposed puts fee on sports wagers
A bill has been proposed by Republican State Senator Bill Blessing, based in the Cincinnati area, that would put a two percent fee on sports wagers.The bill is
Worried about the midterms, Republicans mobilize rural Virginia voters against redistricting
Republican groups are mounting an intensifying, 11th-hour campaign to mobilize rural voters ahead of Virginia’s April 21 referendum to redraw its US House maps. At stake are as many as four US House seats Democrats want to redraw in their favor for the midterms. To maximize Democratic advantage, the map would put wealthy Washington, DC, suburbs in the same districts as farm communities 90 miles away, including in one misshapen district nicknamed the “lobster claw.”
Rep. Thomas Massie puts his Republican 'brand' against Trump's in Kentucky
Massie is touting his independence and trying to turn the president into an afterthought as he faces Trump-endorsed Ed Gallrein next month in a tough GOP primary.
Inside Iowa Politics: How Republican pushes for change but continue GOP leadership
Zach Lahn, a Republican from Belle Plaine running for governor, is pushing for changes as he hopes to continue Republican leadership in the state.
Inside Iowa Politics: How Republican pushes for change but continue GOP leadership
Zach Lahn, a Republican from Belle Plaine running for governor, is pushing for changes as he hopes to continue Republican leadership in the state.
Inside Iowa Politics: How Republican pushes for change but continue GOP leadership
Zach Lahn, a Republican from Belle Plaine running for governor, is pushing for changes as he hopes to continue Republican leadership in the state.
Republicans are moving to fund Homeland Security 'the hard way' after end of talks
Republicans in Congress are forging ahead with a risky go-it-alone strategy for funding the Department of Homeland Security | KMBZ
Trump again rejects Colorado amid accusations of playing politics with disaster aid
FORT COLLINS, Colo. (AP) — President Donald Trump has again denied a request from Colorado's governor to help people affected by wildfires and flooding, consistent with his approval of major disaster aid to Republican-leaning states at about twice the rate he approves aid requests from Democratic...
Republicans’ big 2026 problem: An unhinged Trump who doesn’t seem to care about them
It’s almost as if President Donald Trump doesn’t care that what he’s doing could torpedo the GOP’s hopes in less than seven months — because Congress doesn’t matter much to his view of power.
Wisconsin GOP leaders keeping door open to partisan gerrymandering ban
Wisconsin Republicans say they are open to dialogue with Gov. Tony Evers on banning partisan gerrymandering.
Why onetime MA Sen. Scott Brown thinks he’s the Republican to flip New Hampshire’s open Senate seat
House Republicans Step Up Scrutiny of ActBlue Over Foreign Donations
Three Republican-led committees, responding to a New York Times report this month, accused the Democratic fund-raising organization of withholding documents from a subpoena request.
Olivia Troye, Ex-Pence Aide, Runs for the House as a Democrat
After spending most of her Washington career as a Republican, she joins a crowded field of Democrats running in a Virginia district that doesn’t exist yet.
House returns as two lawmakers vow to resign amid scandals
Representatives Eric Swalwell, a California Democrat, and Tony Gonzales, a Texas Republican, announced Monday they would resign amid scrutiny over their conduct
Maine GOP calls for ban of transgender girls playing on girls sports teams
Republican lawmakers want their supporters to head to the State House Tuesday to speak out against transgender girls playing on girls sports teams.
ICE surge costs: Business seek relief | FOX 9 Minneapolis-St. Paul
Minneapolis and St. Paul took the hardest hit during the ICE surge, which the cities estimate at more than $300 million in business losses. But business owners in greater Minnesota suffered as well, and some of them are Republican lawmakers.
Republican Rep. Tony Gonzales of Texas says he will retire after admitting to affair with staffer
Gonzales had already said he would not seek reelection after admitting to an affair with a staff member who later died by suicide.
Vance had two high-profile opportunities to prove himself. Both fell flat
In the latter half of 2025, Vice President JD Vance’s future as the next Republican presidential nominee was looking fairly promising. It’s been a series of unfortunate events since then.
Senate Republican calls proposed NASA budget cuts a ‘mistake’
Republican Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) on Sunday criticized the Trump administration’s proposed cuts to NASA. “I think it would be a mistake to put money only in the missions related to explora…
House eyes possible expulsion of multiple members as it returns to Washington
Both parties appear to be factoring in the razor-thin majority that Republicans hold in the chamber as they weigh whether to oust members.
Decades-old Idaho campaign finance laws remain on the books. Why reforms failed
“If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. And I can tell you, nothing’s broke with people raising money,” said Nampa Republican Rep. Brent Crane.
Analysis shows aggressive Republican redistricting in Florida would put more GOP seats at risk
Will a redraw backfire on the Florida GOP? A study by Alex Alvarado suggests so.
Poll: Democrats gaining ground, key races tighten in Florida as Donald Trump drags GOP
Independent voters are breaking sharply toward Democrats, a shift pollsters say could reshape Florida’s political map after years of Republican dominance.
Prediction markets have exploded. What can they tell us about Oregon’s hottest primary race?
The state of the Republican gubernatorial primary has been hard to divine, but gamblers have thoughts.
Trump wanted California Republicans to back Steve Hilton. They didn’t listen
Republicans at their state party convention couldn’t coalesce around one of their two candidates for governor, ending in no endorsement
The Iran war may be on pause but the political fallout is not
The political consequences for President Trump and congressional Republicans are far from over.
As Iran war drags on, midterm forecasts for Republicans get even worse
The GOP was already bracing for a tough election, but with the ceasefire in doubt, gas prices are likely to stay high, and voters’ economic outlook is dismal.
Paul Renner's 'Affordability Now' tour continues Monday in Crawfordville
The Palm Coast Republican continues to emphasize pocket book issues.
California Republicans deadlocked on endorsing governor candidate
Neither Fox News commentator Steve Hilton nor Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco received the required delegate support at the state convention, which ended Sunday.
California Republicans caught between Trump loyalty and winning swing districts
California Republicans embrace Trump at their convention while candidates in competitive races keep him at arm's length to win over voters.
Calls grow for Rep. Swalwell to resign or be expelled over misconduct claims
Several Democratic and Republican lawmakers said they would be in favor of voting to expel Swalwell, as well as Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-Texas), who both face misconduct allegations.
The Guardian view on AI politics: US datacentre protests are a warning to big tech
Editorial: In both Republican and Democratic states, scepticism and hostility towards an unregulated construction boom is growing
Donald Trump's Incompetence Is Costing Him the Country: Commentary
Donald Trump has led us to chaos — war with Iran, spiking gas prices, unstable markets — that may lose him the Republican party and the nation.
Maria Elvira Salazar raises nearly $1M in three months as she gears up for re-election
The South Florida Republican is running for a fourth term in a battleground district.
Young Republicans more skeptical of Iran war, dividing Trump base
Even within Trump’s GOP base, cracks are showing when it comes to the Iran conflict. Younger Republicans are much less likely to support the war.
Pastors Scott Bottoms, Victor Marx win spots in Colorado GOP’s gubernatorial primary at party assembly
Two pastors from Colorado Springs qualified Saturday for the Republican gubernatorial primary ballot at the Colorado GOP’s state assembly in Pueblo in a party meeting that dragged late into the night. State Rep. Scott Bottoms, who is known as one of the legislature’s most conservative members, won top line on the June ballot, while missionary […]
Republicans are torn on following Trump's lead in governor's race
Republicans have a rare, if slim shot at winning the governor’s mansion in deep blue California — but risk blowing it if they’re divided.
Jerry Demings continues to lag behind David Jolly in fundraising race for Democratic gubernatorial nomination
The former Republican has a five-to-one financial edge over the Central Florida political veteran.
“AI polls” are fake polls
A few weeks after Donald Trump’s second presidential win, I took the train up from London (where I was living at the time) to Oxford to attend a conference on polls and forecasts of the 2024 election. Most of the attendees were pollsters or academics, but I also watched presentations from Aaru and Electric Twin, two companies that do what is interchangeably called synthetic sampling, silicon sampling, or synthetic audiences. Stripped of startup jargon, that means they use large language models (LLMs) to simulate responses to public opinion polls by having AI agents take on the role of survey respondents. I had already heard of Aaru thanks to some articles with eye-catching headlines like “No people, no problem: AI chatbots predict elections better than humans” in the months leading up to Election Day. The founders were making some big, some might even say far-fetched claims, such as: “within two years, we will simulate the entire globe — from the way crops are grown in Ukraine to how that impacts production of oil in Iraq, trade through the strait of Malacca, and elections for the mayor of Baltimore.” When Semafor asked Aaru’s cofounders — Cameron Fink and Ned Koh — about my boss, they said “we respect all those who came before us.” Nate (as he so often does) shared his thoughts on Twitter: Fink and Koh were relatively good-natured about this back-and-forth when we spoke at Oxford. They even offered to mail me one of the t-shirts featuring Nate’s quote they apparently had made. I never took them up on the offer, which I now somewhat regret. These synthetic sampling companies fell off my radar for a while, but they do still exist. In fact, Aaru recently received a $1 billion valuation. Is what they’re doing anywhere close to the most important frontier in AI development? Not by a longshot, especially when Anthropic just developed a model so adept at exploiting software vulnerabilities that it’s only being released to 40 companies. Still, silicon sampling is increasingly finding its way into public polling. Axios reported in March that “a majority of people trust their own doctors and nurses” based on findings from Aaru — without mentioning that the “people” in that sentence were actually LLMs. Around the same time, the Public Sentiment Institute “boosted” their online sample of 373 real survey respondents with 114 AI agents.1 (Spoiler alert: even the co-founder of Electric Twin doesn’t think that’s a particularly defensible approach.) Polling companies like Qualtrics and Ipsos are also developing synthetic data panels. So, what should we make of these … “polls”? Let’s get one thing out of the way: whatever they are, they’re not polls in the way that term is usually defined. Subscribe You can’t replace polls with AI On one hand, using LLMs to essentially make up fake survey respondents sort of sounds like the dumbest idea ever, one that will at best imperfectly replicate real polls while introducing all sorts of biases. On the other hand, with LLMs improving at a remarkable, perhaps even alarming rate, maybe that means I’m a dinosaur at the ripe old age of 24 because I still want to rely on polls that talk to actual people. I’m not going to argue that synthetic samples are completely useless. In fact, as I’ll return to later, there is evidence that some techniques can replicate topline survey results quickly and cheaply. But the marketing from certain companies can be slightly optimistic. “No traditional poll will exist by the time the next general election occurs,” said Fink in 2024. We’re just 206 days away from the midterms, and based on the fact that I still have to collect a bunch of polls every day, I’d say he should have run that prediction by a sample of AI agents before the interview.2 To see why synthetic samples can’t replace polls, here’s a quick primer on how they work. The simplest version of these models involves taking a LLM (like ChatGPT or Claude), giving it a demographic profile (e.g., a white, college-educated woman who lives in Utah and makes $70k a year), and then asking it to respond to a survey question. You repeat that process a few thousand times using different demographic profiles and end up with a sample of synthetic survey responses. The actual models used by private companies are more sophisticated than this, usually because they incorporate more hypothesized demographic characteristics for each agent and provide them with extra information. Aaru, for example, feeds agents a diet of news and information they’d be likely to consume, while Electric Twin incorporates their customers’ proprietary data about the audience they’re trying to replicate. The way Ben Warner, the co-founder of Electric Twin, explained it to me was “we have a large amount of data on […] for instance, 5,000 people. Can we make an accurate prediction of how they would respond to another question?” Still, it should be obvious why synthetic samples can’t replace polls. Polling is fundamentally a data collection process. We might use surveys to make predictions by feeding them into election forecasts, but the main purpose of a poll isn’t prediction, it’s gathering new data about what people think and how they feel. Silicon sampling, on the other hand, produces no new data. It’s simply a model: you input LLM training data, demographic prompts, and a bunch of other information, and it spits out a prediction for what a poll would say. We love models here, but models aren’t polls. That difference is an important philosophical sticking point for most pollsters I talk to. “I think politics should stay away from [synthetic sampling], because we’re trying to […] represent the voice of the people,” said Natalie Jackson, a vice president at GQR Insights. Democratic pollster John Hagner told me: “I think I’m just incredibly skeptical of this idea. I don’t think it’s research. At that point, you’re asking the machine to tell you what you already believe.” Hagner has seen some presentations of early synthetic sampling experiments, but so far, “if it’s being used in a campaign, people are keeping it incredibly quiet.”3 But Eli, I hear you saying, aren’t polls themselves increasingly governed by modeling decisions? Indeed they are: pollsters’ choices on which sampling method to use, how to define their likely voter models, and how to weight their samples can and do lead to dramatic differences in the results they publish. Aaru even referenced these limitations in the methodology statement included with that maternal mortality “poll” — although I’m using the term “methodology statement” loosely here, because it doesn’t really explain how the model works at all. We can ignore the (frankly preposterous) implication that synthetic sampling isn’t subject to a separate set of biases. The important point is that there’s still a meaningful difference between using weighting and other statistical techniques on actual polling data and using a model to predict what a poll would say. The latter is far closer to election forecasts or techniques like MRP — potentially useful models, but not a replacement for polls.4 To be fair, other synthetic sampling companies are perfectly happy with the distinction between polls and models. Warner compared polling and synthetic sampling to different tools in a toolbox. “The mistake I think we make is we think that these new tools should either work in exactly the same way or somehow replace these old tools,” he said. “Rather than thinking of it as, okay, so we’ve always had the hammer, we’ve always had the screwdriver, now we’ve got a saw. But don’t use a saw to try [to] do the job of a hammer.” A quick comment from Nate Eli didn’t ask me for a comment — rather rude of him, don’t you think? But since I’m editing this story, I figured I’d add a few quick thoughts rather than putting words in his mouth. Beyond the frequently misleading marketing, what bothers me about the AI “poll” hype is that as AI tools make statistical inference cheaper and/or better (note that these are not synonyms) that actually increases the comparative value of collecting original data. You might be able to train a model to make a reasonable estimate of what some hard-to-reach poll respondent would say — say, a young Black man who voted for Trump. (Such a person checks a number of boxes for a voter who is usually hard to reach in surveys.) Indeed, this is closely related to what models like the Silver Bulletin forecast already do. They essentially smooth out the kinks in noisy survey data by making inferences based on past voting patterns or national polls or surveys of other states. But you don’t actually know what these voters think unless you’re reaching them directly. If there’s a shift in opinion among this subgroup, you’re not going to detect it. So if I were running a campaign, I’d invest more in going the extra mile to find a representative sample of those voters. And then I’d hire some smart quants — or Claude? — to figure out the implications for campaign strategy based on proprietary data that my competitors didn’t have access to. -Nate Silver Are these models any good? If synthetic surveys are just a new type of model, the next obvious question is whether the models are at least accurate. The answer very much depends on who you ask. On one end of the spectrum, you have the maximalist argument that synthetic sampling is more accurate than actual polls. “It’s an incredibly challenging problem to go to someone and say ‘hey, we’re going to be more accurate at predicting human behavior than you, even when you talk to your customers directly’,” Koh recently told CNBC. In his view, synthetic sampling isn’t a saw to polling’s hammer, it’s “magic.” There’s certainly evidence that synthetic samples can replicate certain survey toplines. But if Aaru does have any examples of their approach outperforming the polls, they’re keeping those to themselves.5 Aaru’s 2024 election model, for example, had Kamala Harris leading in Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin on November 4th. And although they’ve since taken down their forecast page, they gave Harris a 50.5 percent chance of winning the race on November 2nd.6 After the election, Fink told Semafor he was happy enough with those results because they were “within margin of error,” a term that is completely meaningless when applied to a “sample” of AI agents. And of course, Aaru says their models have improved since 2024, so supposedly now they’d be more accurate than the polls? Still, their stronger argument is on cost: “We are significantly faster and cheaper than traditional polling, and still more accurate,” said Fink. The first two claims are undeniably true, but the third brings us to the opposite end of the spectrum. Both Jackson and Hagner are skeptical that these models are reliable for anything beyond replicating common survey toplines. “I just […] don’t think the machines are what we want when we’re looking for nuanced views. My example on this is people in Arizona and Nevada in 2024 who voted for Trump and voted for expanding abortion in their states on ballot initiatives,” said Jackson. Hagner identified another issue. Maybe the synthetic respondents, like sycophantic LLMs, are inhuman in one important way: they’re too nice. “The reports that have come through at the meetings that I’ve been at are that the early experiments on this, they cannot get respondents to be as racist or sexist or, frankly, as negative as human respondents,” he said. Academic research mostly agrees on this point. While there are some papers that show promising results when using LLMs to replicate polling data, most show that LLMs suffer from various quirks like producing too few “don’t know” responses and can seriously overpredict the favorability of politicians like Donald Trump and Kamala Harris. They also seem to struggle with too little variation between demographic subgroups, so the difference in predicted opinion between Democrats and Republicans, for example, is too small. When I asked Warner about these studies, his response to these papers was that just because academics can’t get synthetic sampling to work doesn’t mean that the technique doesn’t work in general. “Actually, the argument is, okay, yours does not [work]. That does not mean […] for this complex set of machinery, which uses a lot of investment, a lot of time, a lot of money, you can’t get it to work.” Cards on the table, I’m somewhat sympathetic to this argument because academics aren’t exactly great at making election forecasts. Usually, the people with skin in the game are the most accurate. Warner’s argument is that the approach Electric Twin takes — which includes, for example, making multiple predictions for each synthetic respondent using different models and prompts and subsequently averaging those to get a final prediction in a sort of ensemble forecast — produces better results than the simpler academic models. Warner shared a comparison between his method and the method from a recent academic paper with me, and Electric Twin was indeed able to get more accurate replication. But even still, he acknowledged that synthetic sampling “is not a crystal ball.” “If you asked me, do I think using other data sources will be more accurate than asking somebody who they will vote for, I would probably say no. But if you asked me ‘would your system be useful for our turnout modeling today?’ I would say yes.” For better or worse, it looks like the method is already getting more popular in the market research world. Most of the clients Aaru touts these days are businesses like EY and McDonald’s. And AI will probably begin to pop up in other parts of the political polling process. Pollsters are already using it to code open-ended survey responses, and some firms, like YouGov, are testing using LLMs to ask survey respondents questions. More worryingly, one danger to actual polls is that AI agents can be used to infiltrate online surveys. Most online polls use various checks to prevent that from happening, but there’s conflicting evidence on how effective those filters are and how prevalent AI agents currently are in online panels. If those agents ever become impossible to detect, it might spell the end of online polling, but the solution isn’t to replace all of your respondents with ChatGPT. Silver Bulletin is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support our work, consider becoming a subscriber. Subscribe 1 That particular poll obviously doesn’t meet Silver Bulletin standards for aggregation. But we exclude all Public Sentiment Institute polls from our averages because we classify them as an amateur polling firm. 2 You could argue that Fink meant the next presidential election, but (a) I’m also confident we’ll still have real polls in 2028 and (b) in that case he should have asked an LLM to define “general election.” 3 Quick caveat: that’s reporting from a Democratic pollster. It’s possible that Republicans are more willing to use AI in political campaigns. 4 Indeed, Silver Bulletin does not include “polls” produced by MRP in our forecasts or averages, and we think it’s extremely misleading when their practitioners describe them in a way that suggests original data had been collected among a large number of states or Congressional districts. 5 A recent report from Aaru and EY did show two examples of a synthetic estimate being closer than a survey to a real-world benchmark — but I’d take those findings with a grain of salt because the report reads more like an ad and didn’t involve any sort of prediction being made ahead of time. 6 For comparison, our odds for Harris on the same day were 48.2 percent.
‘It’s solid gold’: Some Texas Republicans ramp up criticisms of Muslims to energize primary voters
Running in a contentious race to keep his seat, US Sen. John Cornyn put out an ad vowing to fight “radical Islam.”
For aging US Supreme Court justices, the politics of retirement looms large
When Donald Trump was asked about the prospect of conservative Justices Samuel Alito or Clarence Thomas retiring, the Republican president voiced his support for the U.S. Supreme Court's two oldest members to remain on the bench.
How Congress’s bipartisan high point led to our era of political rancor
36 years ago, a Republican president and Democratic lawmakers produced monumental laws. Now, a broken Congress has enabled Trump to undo key parts of that legacy.
Fleming, Cassidy, Letlow
Treasurer John Fleming, left, Sen. Bill Cassidy, center, and Rep. Julia Letlow, right, are all running in the Republican primary for U.S. Senate.
Trump Moves Top Aide James Blair to Political Operation Ahead of Midterms
Mr. Blair will “lead the charge from the outside,” the president said on social media. The move comes as Republicans are bracing for a potentially difficult November election.
Trump Moves Top Aide James Blair to Political Operation Ahead of Midterm
Mr. Blair will “lead the charge from the outside,” the president said on social media. The move comes as Republicans are bracing for a potentially difficult November election.
DAVID MARCUS: Virginia's battle over gerrymandering betrays our broken politics
A Virginia referendum on redistricting could redraw U.S. House maps from 6-5 to 10-1 for Democrats, raising fears of disenfranchising Republicans.
Trump administration admits a glaring error in its New York health fraud accusations
The error, admitted first to the AP, prompted health analysts to question how many of the Republican administration’s sweeping anti-fraud efforts were based on faulty findings.
AP report: Trump administration admits a glaring error in its New York health fraud accusations
The error, which the administration admitted first to The Associated Press, prompted health analysts to question how many of the Republican administration’s sweeping anti-fraud efforts around the country were based on faulty findings.
North Carolina Republicans Are Trying to Give One of the Country’s Most Partisan Judges a Frightening New Power
Over the past several years, the state’s Republicans have attempted—with varying degrees of success—power grab after power grab.
Democrats blast coming congressional redistricting session: ‘This is illegal’
For now, Republicans are pushing forward.
Trump admits error in accusations about New York health care fraud
The error prompted health analysts to question how many of the Republican administration’s sweeping anti-fraud efforts around the country were based on faulty findings.
How the White House tried – and failed – to push a candidate out of a Republican state Senate primary in Indiana
With Trump’s sights set on unseating Indiana lawmakers who opposed his redistricting effort, his aides and allies feared a third candidate could play spoiler in one race.
Trump’s tenuous Iran exit plan isn't healing Republican rifts exposed by the war
President Donald Trump's efforts to exit the war in Iran are causing tension within the Republican Party | 830 WCCO
Trump’s tenuous Iran exit plan isn't healing Republican rifts exposed by the war
President Donald Trump's efforts to exit the war in Iran are causing tension within the Republican Party | KMBZ
Supreme Court blocks candidate after alleged GOP infiltration scheme exposed
The Supreme Court rejected a progressive candidate's bid to enter Ohio's Republican primary after he allegedly misrepresented party affiliation.
So When Can We Call Wisconsin a Blue State?
The state’s Republicans are in a dire situation. Let’s keep it that way.
'We got our butts kicked.' Republicans rattled by Democratic momentum ahead of midterms
Simmering discontent could boomerang on Republicans just two years after Trump harnessed voters' anger with his comeback presidential campaign.
House Republicans block Democrats' latest bid for war powers resolution
In a pro forma session in the House Thursday, GOP Speaker Pro-tem Rep. Christopher Smith didn't acknowledge Democrats' request for unanimous consent
Democrats grow bolder on talk about removing Trump from office after his Iran threats
While President Donald Trump eventually pulled back on his threat and agreed to a two-week ceasefire with Iran, Democrats face growing demands to oppose the Republican president in the strongest possible terms.
Colorado Springs’ mayor has a new chief of staff. It’s the guy he trounced in the election.
Mayor Yemi Mobolade on Thursday named Wayne Williams his chief of staff. Williams, a Republican who is Colorado’s former secretary of state, lost to Mobolade in the 2023 mayoral election.
Republicans block Democratic bill to end Iran war amid tenuous ceasefire
Republicans in the House of Representatives blocked Democrats from considering a measure to halt military hostilities in Iran.
Republicans block effort to halt Trump's war with Iran after 'civilization' threat
House Democrats tried to force a vote on a war powers resolution during recess. Senate Democrats will launch a more serious attempt to rein in Trump when Congress returns next week.
Bondi to defy House Epstein subpoena
Democrats and some Republicans criticized Bondi for the move
Political oversight reaches Texas college classrooms, with Texas Tech and A&M at the forefront
Public universities across Texas have instituted sweeping changes to course teachings and offerings in recent months, in a bid to appease concerns from Republican lawmakers that they're indoctrinating students with what they consider to be liberal ideas.