Rob Finnerty Accuses Mainstream Media of Repeating Its 2016, 2020 and 2024 Polling Playbook

Newsmax host Rob Finnerty has criticised what he described as the “liberal media” over its coverage of election polling, arguing that the same pattern seen during previous presidential election cycles is being repeated in the run-up to another major election.

Finnerty said the media are doing “exactly what they did in 2016, exactly what they did in 2020, and exactly what they did in 2024,” while arguing that millions of Americans are once again accepting the polling narrative. His comments put renewed attention on the reliability of political polling and the way survey results are presented to the public.

Rob Finnerty Questions the Media’s Polling Narrative

Finnerty’s criticism comes as polling increasingly becomes part of the political conversation ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. His argument is that Americans should be cautious about treating individual polls or broader media interpretations of polling as definitive indications of what voters will ultimately do.

His comments reflect a wider political debate over polling accuracy, particularly after polling organizations experienced notable difficulties during the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections. Pew Research Center reported that many polls underestimated Republican support in both elections, with the problem particularly pronounced in state-level polling.

2016 and 2020 Polling Errors Remain Part of the Debate

The criticism of polling is not entirely new. Pew Research Center noted that state polling in 2016 and 2020 was affected by significant errors, while a review of 2020 polling by the American Association for Public Opinion Research described the polling error as unusually large.

However, polling organizations have also changed their methods since those elections. Pew found that 61% of national pollsters that conducted surveys in both 2016 and 2022 had changed their methodology by 2022, while more than a third changed their methods between 2020 and 2022. That means Finnerty’s comparison with earlier election cycles does not by itself establish that current polling suffers from exactly the same problems.

Polls, Media Coverage and Voter Perception

The controversy also extends beyond the accuracy of individual surveys to how media organizations interpret and present them. A poll measures opinions within a particular population and at a particular point in time; differences in sampling, weighting, turnout assumptions and methodology can produce different results.

Finnerty’s remarks therefore add another voice to an ongoing argument over whether voters should place substantial weight on polling narratives during an election campaign. While his comments challenge the credibility of what he considers mainstream media coverage, polling researchers have continued to study and modify their methods in response to past errors.

As the 2026 election cycle develops, competing interpretations of polling are likely to remain part of the political conversation. Finnerty’s criticism represents his assessment of the media’s coverage, while the documented polling record shows both significant past errors and subsequent methodological changes. OGM News will continue to follow the debate over polling, media coverage and voter opinion.