Reality socked pollster Frank Luntz square in the teeth and forced him to admit “Everything that I would have…said to you was impossible is actually happening,” just as new data came out about former President Donald Trump’s position in the 2024 primary.
Tuesday, The Sydney Morning Herald published an interview conducted with Luntz who was in London speaking at the Centre for Policy Studies’ Margaret Thatcher conference. During the discussion, the pollster was left retracting comments he had made in Oct. 2021 regarding Trump’s chances of reclaiming the White House.
“I now have to acknowledge that it is a distinct possibility that Donald Trump could be elected — I did not believe that one year ago,” he told the Herald’s Latika Bourke.
The admission comes just days after Trump was charged with 37 felony counts in a federal indictment related to his possession of documents marked classified, a fact that a CBS News poll found left Republican voters wholly undeterred from supporting the president.
With data collected before and after the indictment was announced, CBS presented the largest lead Trump has held over his nearest competitor, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, at 38 points. The 61 to 23 percent spread saw all other candidates trailing in single digits.
CBS News Poll: Trump Posts Biggest Lead Yet Over DeSantis
Trump — 61% (+38)
DeSantis — 23%
T. Scott — 4%
Pence — 4%
Haley — 3%
Ramaswamy — 1%
Hutchinson — 1%
Burgum — 1%
Elder — 1%
Christie — 1%CBS Poll (B+) | 06/07-10 | n=586https://t.co/V076JVS4Iw pic.twitter.com/pQjIqvYCV4
— InteractivePolls (@IAPolls2022) June 11, 2023
“I did not believe that the search of Mar-a-Lago would be handled so badly, I did not believe that the indictment of him in New York would be handled so badly,” Luntz continued as though Russian collusion, a sham Jan. 6 committee and multiple impeachments hadn’t already happened. “I did not believe that his opponents would be so inept as to actually strengthen him and the combination of all of those makes him now viable, not just in the Republican primary but in the general election.”
According to the findings from CBS News, the ongoing political persecution of Trump has left many Republican voters more troubled by the motivations of the indictment “than his alleged conduct being a national security risk.”
“Most explicitly ruled out the charges announced in the indictment changing their views about Mr. Trump,” the outlet stated. “Rather than being disqualifying in their eyes, even if he’s ultimately convicted of a crime in the matter, they overwhelmingly feel he should still be able to serve as president again.”
Having distanced himself from impartiality long ago, Luntz let loose the hyperbole and asserted, “It’s now conceivable that in 2024 the country comes apart.”
“We have a 15 percent likelihood of that destroying American democracy depending on what happens,” he said of a second Trump administration, giving prioritization to NATO, Ukraine and the weaponized DOJ. “NATO is in jeopardy, clearly. Ukraine will no longer receive American support. Our legal system will be in jeopardy — I don’t want to contemplate it.”
In 2021, Luntz declared, “He will not win. If Trump runs again he will be nominated by the Republicans, but he will never be elected president because there are too many people who hate him,” and he retracted those comments to Bourke saying, “Everything that I would have [previously] said to you was impossible is actually happening.”
“The Roman Empire could never fall until it fell, the sun never set on the British Empire until it came apart, the Greeks created civilisation and now look where Greece is.”
Luntz went on to suggest, “Democracies can survive negativity and they can survive division. They cannot survive rejection of the truth because in the end, the foundation of democracy is knowing the truth, that’s how voters vote correctly.” (emphasis added.)
Native of Brooklyn, NY, Kevin Haggerty is a graduate of Hunter College where he studied Cultural Anthropology and Geography. An avid reader and truth seeker, he currently resides in Texas with his wife and their dog and, when he isn't researching current events and their impacts, you'll find him spending time with friends and family or working on his next novel.
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