tonight on "kqed newsroom," with the election just four days away, president trump and joe biden make their closing pitches, but with a cord number of people voting by mail, the winner may not be known for some time. we take a look back at the history of election polling, includinrppresident trump's sing upset in 2016 with the other the new book "lost in the gallop." and people with different political views spark a romantic collection? we hear from a host of a dating podcast about the experiment. we will revel in a time honored traditio welcome to "kqed newsroom." i'm priya david clemens. and now for "kqed newsroom"'s election 2020 coverage.

we're finally herein the last november 3, elecday. ay, voters have submitted early ballots in record numbers with roughly 80 million votes already cast. in the nearly 4 years since president trump took office, regulations have been rolled back, immigration has been th curtailed, andamerican judicial system has become significantly more conservative. this week, amy coney barrett was sworn in as thnew a monday night ceremonythe a white house lawn. but according to polls him her confirmation has not yet proven to be a game changefor president trump. democratic rival joe biden is leading in several critical states and has raised more money. joining me now by skype san francisco, our turn on politics and government senior editor scott shafer and kqed politics and government correspondent marisa lagos, thank you for joining us. rst week of covid cases in the nation, the california has silver avoided a spike. we expected the pandemic wago g to increase early mail-in voting, but the numbers are far above what was expected. who

benefits from this electoral surge? >> the conventional wisdom, priya, whenever there's a larger than expected turnout, democrats tend to benefit more the republicans because re blicans historically are very reliable voters, were as you have a loof occasional voters among democrats, first- more low invoters. r voters, those are all folks who sometimes vote and sometimes they don't for various reasons. so you woul guess that in a lot of placesthis figure turnout is going to help joe biden and any other democrats on the ticket, but i think we all ha to becareful in making too many assumptions about things. we do have to wait for the ballots to be counted. we expect a lot of republicans to show on election day to vote in person, partly because of what president trump has been saying, that voting by mail is not safe, it is rigged, which it isn't of course, but it's had an impact on

republicans. >> do you pect election da to turn into election week, or longer, marisa? >> i mean, it's going to depend where you ar and in california, that's been the case for a decade. it's very unusual and he really contested races here are settled on election night. i would expect that, you know, presidential race wiseg it's go depend on what we're seeing as those early returns are finally counted and some of the states we'll be watching like florida do allow processingllot before it:00 p.m. on election day, but the big question here in california is going to be some of those tighter measures , ballot measure races, where polling shows they are really n neck and we're not going to be able to make a call until have althe votes counted. >> scott, berkeley and i just put out a recent poll of californntns. 87% of responsaid they worry that many americans we'll not respect the outcome of this

year's presidential election , and a similar number, nearly 9 out of 10 people think viol ce is liketo occur if there are disputes about who won the election. yikes! would you expect the sort of civil action to center in washington, d.c., or would it >> it is hard to say. i think these are very genuine and legitimate concerns. you know, we have t heard a of comments from the president calling into question whether or not he would actually accept the resutis of the el if l es. i think, you know, there was an analysis done by an international organization that look for troublspots around the world, and the states they focused in on were places like oregon where there's a big timimovement, pennsylvania, north carolina, a well, but i don't think it would necessarily be focused on d.c., and i think i we'll look more at some of the state center especially if they turn out on election tobe really close , then of course to see what the president does and says. if he declar victory before all the votes are counted, i think you're going to see potentially both sides out on et

the st, and 'syou know, also concerning. we've seen a big uptick in the number of guns purchased. the country is extremely polarized because a lot of anxiety, so i think is good reason to be concerned, anxious. t's just hope all it, none of it plays out. >> of course, there is concern whether president trump would ho vacate the white. marisa, let's turn to kamala harris, our senator here in california. joe biden had a big fundraising day whhe announced she would be his running mate. what has been her net impact on the presidential ticket. >> $26 million in the firs24 hours after that announcement. the biden campaign also took in more than twice what it had in august after her announcement. after coming out twice and august what i had in july of that announcement. we see her sorority sisters ph from alpha kappa which hearted at howard university 22,000 individual donations alone, so i think this has excited the days at biden wa really hoping for women in color in particular.

we saw after the debate for example, a huge fundraising haul for democrats because the vice presidential debate. i think this has worked, you know, and i've talked to folks close to her. i think democrats still have some problems withmen of color, latinos and black men in particular. they're going to have work to after they wibut i think n kamala harris has served to shore up some of the basin the fundraising numbs biden was hoping she would. >> scott, what we'll it mean for california if kamala harris becomes the new vice president. >> would be extraordinary not just for utcaliforniathe whole country. certainly would nancy pelosi as speaker and kamala harris as vice president, we would have a pipeline to the white house and general, really for the country and perhaps for the world, seeing someone like kamala harris, a woman of lor, of mixed race dissent, becoming vice president, she is a very different kind of person than we have seen in that job ever before. i was thinking about this earlier today, and she's more of like a justin trudeau, un

someone who's r, more youthful, more hip, little bit less formal, and that glass ceiling has never been broken, but it would mean a lot for co california, and ofse for the country if she were to become vice president. it uld be extra ordinary. >> marisa, let's turn to the region. you been talking to californians helping democrats work to fliparizona blue. what are you hearing from them? >> a lot of excitement first of all. i've talked to ofa number people who've either done phone or text banking from california or even some folks who've gone out there and be in fullppe to do doorknocking. i think they see this state as a real potential. mark kelly is up. at the democrat running against martha mcsally in the senate race there. we see biden really making some inroads, and it's going to come down to think a tight race

there, but i think californians really felt this year, democrats at least, that ey di nowant to be on the sidelines like they felt they might've been in 2016 waiting for results, ani thinthey say that you know, in recent weeks, conversations have sifted from we'll you vote for biden and harrison making sure balance are in. i think a lot of people these days are fatigued and tired of the calls and texts, and are saying at this point i voted, is a win for these volunteers. >> scott, let's move to the supreme court. it's already weighed in on one aspe of the electibecause they sided with the trump administration and wisconsin case preventing ballots from being counted after the election dayeven if they were postmarks from before the election they. have also taken some other actions. what are you watching? so >> i think far, supreme court has mostly deferred to the states. had they not overturned or confirmed what the state courts have tried to do, i think one of the most concerning aspect of all these rulings happened in sconsin, where they decided , the court decided to uphd

wisconsin's le that ballots that come in after the election would not be counted, even if they are postmarked by election day. and brett kavanaugh in his separate decision in that case suggested along the lines of what president tr p has be saying, which is that ballotsa come in after election day could, the word he used, flip wh the results,h is exactly what president trump has been saying to undermine the integrity and confidence in the voting, so that really got the antennas up of a lot of the civil rights and voting rights folks, democrats. there was inanother case vermont where he alluded to vermont, where he incorrectly wrote what was happening in vermon, and the state asked him to change his decision. he went back and amded a, so i think everyone is on hyper alert, and i think the big question is what happens after the election?

do some of these cases come back to court with amy coney barrett, who so far has no in weigheon any of these cases? >> we've been talking a lot about the presidency. the democrats are fighting e win senate because they need to win the extra seats if biden/harris takes the white ticket. four trump/pence >> mitch mcconnell, the senate majority leader, republican says they are 50-50. we've heard him warn republicans thiscould go democrats' way. don't want to say anything as for sure until those are counted, but there are nine ea republican either leaned democratic or are considered tossup's under the political report which is a pretty well- úgron nonp. tisan analysis only one democrat. and arizona, we have you know, colorado where it looks good for democrats, d a number other states. even places like georgia that a couple of years we would not have been talking k out. i thit's looking good for dems, but obviously, we won't countedan, as scott tes are

happened, that does not have to happen on election night. >> the state of state office released its final free election update on voter registration, and it says there's a record number of californians blt 22 million who've registered to vote. that's 2 million more than 2016. let's turn to a statewide ballot measure, prop 21. this would give cities more power to enact rent control, protections. how is that doing among likely california voters? >> not very well, and a similar measure prop 10 was on the was overwhelmingly rejected by voters. i think this time around, some voters remember that earlier ballot measure and ere wog why is is back on the ballot cuba we have not changed our minds. governor newsom signed legislatprn expanding some ections for renters, so perhaps the voters want to wait and see how those steps address the problem, but it is not doing well. it's under 40%, and that's not a good sign this close to the ela tion, so it has real steep

toclimb make. >> scott shafer and marisa lagos leading our excellent politics team, thank you so much, and ergood luck the next few days and weeks. >> thank you so much. visit kqed.org/voterguide . at this time in 2016, just days before the presidential election, hillary clinton sehas like she the win on lock. poll after poll predicted or easy victory, but that was not to be. co so howd the pollsters be so wrong, and since they were wrong in 2016, could they be wrong again in predicting joe biden's victory this year? tonight, we delve into thta history lions of polling in america killjoy necas from skype from kensington, maryland, joseph campbell, the author of "lost in the gallop." thanks for joining us this evening, joe. >>reit's a pleasure to be on your show.

>> you journals before you became an academic. talk us through how u saw polling before you started on your research for this book, and how those views have changed. >> i ought polling was pretty reliable. i gave polling the benefit of the doubt that these numbers, the numbers were going to be accurate, and i did not give it a second thoughtas, but i got into the research for lost in the gallop, it became clear that polling is an imperfect instrument, susceptible to faile and susceptible toro of different kinds. >> you were spurred to write this book because of the 2016 election. we cannohelp but look ck at that and recalled how very wrong it went. is here come the polls in general have ahjoe biden d of donald trump. should we believe them? >> we should keep in mind that polling does have a checkered past, and it's important to wrong, and when they go wrong,

they can go wrong in surprising ways, and unpredicted ways, before, so not all polling failures are quite alike. just like no two presidential elections are the same ther. we've sethe 2016 model policing the 1948 model when polled across the board were about dewey defetruman y wrong election, when harry truman won a surprise and dramatic upset electi. so we see l these different varieties of polling failure, and i think we're going to come fail, they may fail in a surprising way, away we did not expect and a way that does ort miny previous polling failure. >> let's talk about why some of this is. what are the challenges pollsterface when theyare trying to get answers and put their finger on the pulse of americans? >> one of the albiggest nges in getting a decent response rate, and it used to be the gold standard of polling used to be that they would use i telephone, la telephones, random digit dialing so they could reach listed as well as unlisted phone numbers, and

becae e most people in country, and i'm thinking the 70s and 80s and into the 90s, had telephones, that was a od pretty reliable meof getting a representative cross- section of the country. with the demise or the decline of land lines, we're seeing fewer and fewer people with land lines and fewer and fewer people answering the phone because they don't want to be harassed by telemarketers or other scamme or whatever the response rates in polling by phonefo, the er gold standard, have dropped off dramatically into the single digits 5, 6,7%, so to get a decent sample that way is very difficult, very time-consuming, and obviously very expensive, sohat is a jor principal challenge pollsters that they are facing these days. >> we do have the internet out. has annot gotten better? >> the internet is a tempting option for pollsters, but they still have not figured t the way to get a real good representative sample using internet-based methodologies. and pollsters have been trying since the late 1990s, since the

early days of the popular al internet to tap that platform and figure out a way to get a reasonably reliable sample, and so far it has not really happened. some polling organizations havee recrvia the internet panels of respondents, people who did go back time and time again r responses, and that's a very promising methodology, but it is somewhat expeive and not everybody has adopted it . so the polling industry is one that is in a state of flux right now, iya, and there's lot of experimentation going on with a lot of different methodologies. there is no single gold st>>dard anymore. ou know, a lot of our work as journalists is based on what we see as in the polls, where we see whis up and who is down, and viewers and voters, they depend on that information. are you teing us that really, we should not? >> we should not rule out polls is automatically in error and disregard them completely, but

i think we should keep in mind that polling does have a checkered past. and to realize these are imperfect instruments they are useful tools, but they are not the only tool, but e u are quright. journalists in particular rely heavily on polls to set the conventional or minant narrative of election campaigns, and polls are the centerpiece of that narrative creation, if you will, and when polls go wrong, inevitably journalism stumbles a bit too. there is rthationship, polling failure equates to journalistic failure, and we saw that in 2002 when polls were right, donald trump had no chance of winning the election, and we recall the shock the day after the election, when trump won a >> hood you think is going to win ine election loat the

polls? >> are you going to do that? failures, so i thini know ng best not to make any predictions, but let me tell you this, priya. the likelihood th the polls une way off,, ersally off, and joe biden is going to lose the popular vote in 2020? that is very unlikely. that is very unlikely. now how the electoral college br is going to k that even though we are a few days of election, that is still up in the air. >> w. joseph campbell, thank you so much for ining us the show tonight, the author of "lost in the gallop." >> priya, thank you very much, a pleasure. a new national poll by the associated press shows 85% of registered voters describe americans as being greatly di ded in their values.'s political partisanship has grown, studies also show the numbbe of intermarriages een people in different political parties is shrinking significantly. our next guests renin experiment on their dang podcast toget an inside look at this relationship phenomenon. joining me now by skype from san francisco are the cohost of the datable podcast. ladies, thank you for joining

us. tell us about this mini dating experiment, u decided to run it? >> priya, gets pretty juicy because we talk about dealbreaker so much on our as po and a lot of people this year said a dealbreaker for me is dating someone of opposing polit al beliefs, so ought that's a very strong statement. let's put that to the test, let's set up a blind dating h experiment wo people who have opposing political beliefs , to see if romance can develop from tact. so we d out to facebook groups, our own community, our own network, as well as we went out there on social medito see who would be brave enough to partake. >> and you did eveno ally find daters, kiki and tom. julie, tell us who they are, something about their selected them. d why you >> first and foremost, they were both single. they are s in their in new york city, and kiki is more liberal, voting for biden, where m is a registered

republican and either voting for trump or jo jorgensen, and the reason why we picked that was they were first of all welli verspolitics, so they could have a very educated, open conversation. they also found this experiment to be intriguing, so they really came in with a very open mind. they also had lot common outside of politics, like they both were into arts, they both have similar values of what ok they were g for in a partner, and similar lifestyles. >> in yue, did you find that you were siftg through the different applications of people who came in, that there were any differences between republicans and democrats in their interest in dating across the aisle? >> the democratwere very triggered. we got more messages from democrats who said i would never partake in this. this is very triggering for me. i don't d ink i cogo with this experiment, but the republican applicants were a lot more open, and th said i have been wanting to have an

open communication and conversation with someone frcr the deic party, so they were much more open to it. >> julie, was that surprising to the two of u? >> itwas, and i think what i learned too as people make rash generalizations about the party, wd,re in today's wo it may not even be democrat versus republican. it is what ever values that they have. >> hoyue, did bringing a politics change the dynamic of the date for kiki and tom? >> the first e lf of day we told him no politics. they can talk about anything but. a student of politics were on the table , we felt the tension, and that was a word that both of them used in their post-interview. they felthat uncomfortable tension, in because this is when it got real, when it got personal. but what was beautiful abount this experiwas that by the end, they were able to find some sort of common ground and to openly hear each other out, so it was not coa lict or it

was not a debate. it was more about where can we find coon ground >>want to listen to a clip from the zoom date you set up for them, and this isone in which they talk about president trump, and kiki begins at, so let's listen in. >> i think about,you know, his rhetoric being so aggressive. to me, and like his -- i don't think he's been running things very wellin the pandemic. all of these things, to me, have felt like almost personal, you know wh? i me how do you feel about that úwho feels what he's doing is er verynal and hurtful? do you align with that, sympathy for the, compassion for that? and how does that inform how you decide to move forward? >> i think i cothd start wi denouncing racism. he certainly could have, and i would argue should have made a like that moment in the debate,s

but he spoff-the-cuff, and his off-the-cuff remarks don't always come over very well. the other i guess counter to that is i think his bark is worse than his bike. >> so julie, how did this conversation continue to play out? did deit foster tanding, or did it create more division between the two? >> i think both of daters walked away ying it waa good conversation. there was not a huge debate. there was that tension as yue mentioned. what we learned, though, is that everything else needs to be 100% because stthis is l a big hurdle to overcome , and i think where kiki was coming from is that she felt like a lot of this was personal, and tom could rst fully unnd. >> yue, for you, what were some takeaways from this experiment? >> one big take away is what if we approached politics like g da these two people came on this

date. you don't go on a date helping the other person fails. e you hope they good match, so they came on the day trying to find common ground and try st to undd each other. we sometimes approach politics like a debate. we want the other party to fail, and we nt to hewhy they are so wrong and why we're so right, but in this experiment, you could see that n they came with such a positive, open mind, that they were able to more productive conversations. >> jue e, do you feel pandemic has shifted how people talk about politics? it seems they are bringing up earlier. >> absolutely. i think g ople are lookto get deeper, quicker because we're not dating multiple people at once, and we are potentially entering rbese more relationships that move faster, so you want to know someone that aligns with you from a values perspeive. i ink though inevitably, this election is just so huge, that it cannotoncome up a date right now.

>> if you were to run this experiment again, is there somethg you would do differently the next time around, yue? >> we did have time on our side. if we had more ti, i woul love to spaces out into three, four separate dates. after each day, they have some me to digest what was said, then come back nice and fresh. i think another thing is, you know, what we really learned from this experiment is that we just have to go out and vote. i wish there was more conversation that we would've brought in or prompted about t voting. it jows you politics is a personal. kiki felt like i'm voting with my heart, i'm voting with my, wi you know what i've experienced, and tom is very much about policy, so he's voting with what would benefit me from a political policy standpoint? >> julie, if you were to pull back a little bit and look at thwoscene broadly, how d you say that the hyper partisanship of our electorate is being reflected in the dating pooter the issues there? >> i think people are making blanket generalizations, and potentially ruling out half the dating pool. i think what i have learned from this is that it is not so

blk and white. it's not that all republexans ar all democrats are y, and i think people should look more at the individual. of course if their values do not align with you, that's one thing, but i'm gog to lookat it less about you are republican, you are democrat, and more about what you stand for e dividually. >> juafchick and yue xu, thank you so much, ladies. >> thank you, priya. >> thank you. he >> you can more about yue xu and julie stating experiment@datablepodcast.com. and now, for a look at something beautiful. this week we step into a pumpkin patch or two to enjoy the rich colors and traditions of the season. >> ace your pumpkins down.

>> like a captain! don't forget to turn your clocks back october 31, as we and my daylight saving teen. you can find more of our coverage at kqed.org/kqednewsroom. i'm priya david clemens. you can reach me on twitter, facebook, and instagram at priyadclemens. from all of us here at "kqed newsroom," thanks for joining us. good night. ♪ ♪

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present a swinging seenter street celebration. an of the, musical trade, tonight at 9:00. tonight, a special repo, inside the final days of this campaign. >> if i don't sound like a washington pl decision it's because i'm not a politician. >> we p need asident that's going to bring us together, not pull us apart. robert: the future of america on the line, as record numbers vote early and outbreaks spike in key states. >> what's his closing argument? that people are too focused on covid. he's jealous of covid's media robert: democ hope far revival of the obama coalition and push into the south and seat belt it could all come down to pennsylvania. >> what is trump