Trump 2020 campaign manager Brad Parscale calls polls "the biggest joke in politics"
Trump's 2020 campaign manager Brad Parscale dismissed independent polling that showed the president trailing several Democrats on Tuesday, claiming that polls are "the biggest joke in politics."
"The country is too complex now just to call a couple hundred people and ask them what they think. There are so many ways, and different people that are gonna show up to vote now," Parscale said in an exclusive interview with CBS News chief Washington correspondent Major Garrett. "The way turnout now works, the abilities that we have to turn out voters – the polling can't understand that. And that's why it was so wrong in 2016. It was 100% wrong. Nobody got it right. Not one public poll."
A recent Quinnipiac University poll finds Democrat Joe Biden leading Mr. Trump in Florida by nine points. It also shows the president trailing other Democrats in that state. In 2016, Trump won Florida by just over one point.
"None of these polls mean anything," Parscale said. "It's the biggest joke in politics. It's the fakest thing. It's the fakest thing."
When asked why, if polls were meaningless, President Trump appears to pay so much attention to them, Parscale said "you'd have to ask him that." When pressed, he added "because the media makes it look like they matter. They don't."
Trump campaign internal polling showed the president trailing potential Democratic rivals in several key states. The campaign says the polls were intended to show a worst-case scenario.
On Tuesday night, Mr. Trump officially launched his re-election campaign with a kickoff rally in Orlando. In a speech that resembled 2016, he talked about voters' fears and slammed democrats – and said electing a Democratic president would lead to the "destruction of the American dream."