In an interview with the Washington Examiner published on Saturday, Vice President Mike Pence dismissed Joe Biden’s polling lead over President Donald Trump .
“I don’t put a lot of stock in the polls,” Pence said, pointing out that most polls predicted a convincing victory for former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in 2016.
“In the last election, somebody told me that between Labor Day and Election Day, there were over a hundred different polls that were taken in the states or nationwide,” the vice president said.
“The president only led in a handful of them. And then we saw an incredible victory — historic victory — on Election Day,” he continued.
“I sense people are more enthusiastic today than they were four years ago.”
According to the RealClearPolitics average of polling data, Biden is nine percentage points ahead of Trump nationwide. In addition, some surveys suggest that Trump is trailing the Democratic Party’s presumptive presidential nominee in a number of key swing states.
A CNBC /Change Research poll released earlier this month put the Democrat ahead in the states of Arizona, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Florida. Polling also suggests that Trump is losing ground in red-leaning states such as Texas and Georgia.
Most recently, a The Hill /HarrisX survey found that Biden has a four-point advantage over Trump nationwide, while a poll from Rasmussen Reports gave the former vice president a 10-point national lead.
During his conversation with the Washington Examiner , Pence also expressed optimism about Trump’s chances in suburbia, arguing that concerns over the economy — coupled with fears about public safety amid the Black Lives Matter protests — will be enough to push the president over the finish line.
In 2016, Trump won in the suburbs by four percentage points. However, the Democratic Party dominated suburbia in the 2018 midterm elections, taking control of the House of Representatives.
According to Pence, mail-in voting is the biggest threat to Trump’s reelection. Echoing the commander-in-chief, the vice president argued that vote-by-mail systems might be more vulnerable to fraud. He noted, however, that the GOP is not opposed to absentee voting.
Democrats have argued that Americans need to be allowed to vote by mail, citing concerns over public health and safety amid the coronavirus pandemic.
As the publication noted, the Trump campaign plans on dispatching Pence to battleground states, while letting the president put on “headline-grabbing events.” The vice president has apparently been tasked with reaching out to right-leaning voters put off by Trump’s “provocative behavior.”
