DES MOINES, Iowa (Gray Media Iowa State Capitol Bureau) – Accusations, criticism and allegations have been aimed at Iowa pollster J. Ann Selzer for the month of November. The Iowa polling she has conducted for the Des Moines Register since 1997 already earned national accolades for its accuracy.

An analysis by Nate Silver gave it an “A+” rating. No other survey company (Selzer & Co.) in the United States had a higher ranking for accuracy than Selzer.

His poll, however, was far from being that of 2024.

The weekend before Election Day 2024, the Iowa poll showed Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris with a three-point lead over Republican Donald Trump in the state. But Trump won on Election Day by 13 points. A huge failure for Selzer.

Selzer said she is confident in her methodology, the methodology she has used for years. But this year, it didn’t work. Critics on social media alleged something nefarious. Was Selzer trying to get Democrats excited before the election with her poll results? Was she trying to stop Trump? Was she paid to help Democrats and hurt Republicans, as some claim?

No, to all of these questions, she asked Gray Media Iowa and called all of these accusations baseless, baseless and “beyond annoying.”

Selzer said she didn’t do anything different in 2024 compared to the general election poll that showed Trump winning in 2016 and 2020. In fact, her last poll in Iowa for his two races in Iowa matched the final election totals almost exactly. .

Cook Political Report analyst Matthew Klein looked at Selzer’s Iowa poll results since 2012, with Selzer’s final Iowa poll number followed by the election outcome. The results accurately showed that Trump would win comfortably in 2016 and 2020.

Selzer’s latest pre-election polls predicted similar success for Chuck Grassley, a Republican, in his 2022 U.S. Senate race; and Joni Ernst, a Republican, during her runs for the U.S. Senate in 2014 and 2020. Her polling also showed that presidential candidate Barack Obama, a Democrat, in 2012 would win the state again.

The only time election results were outside Selzer’s margin of error in Klein’s sample was in 2018, when the poll showed Fred Hubbell, a Democrat, leading Kim Reynolds, a Republican , in the race for governor. Reynolds won.

Selzer announced following the 2024 election that she was withdrawing from election polling and said she informed the Des Moines Register in 2023 that her 2024 election poll would be her last.

Read his announcement here.

Des Moines Register Editor-in-Chief Carol Hunter confirmed the agreement regarding Selzer’s retirement from election polling. She also explained the review of issues with the survey.

Read that here.

President-elect Donald Trump has called for an investigation into Selzer’s Iowa polling.

Iowa Republican Party leader Jeff Kaufmann posted this message on X/Twitter on election night, following Selzer’s latest poll that showed Harris leading Trump by three points.

Selzer told Gray Media Iowa that West Des Moines police came to speak with him to tell him about the online discussions. She did not call the conversation with law enforcement “a direct threat to her life” but said she took extra safety precautions following the warning.

Gray Media Iowa contacted West Des Moines police. A spokesperson said there was no “active investigation” into the specific threats against Selzer, that he could neither confirm nor deny the officers’ safety warning to Selzer, and that he would not be allowed to divulge what the agents had discussed with Selzer if they went to see her.

In the video below, Selzer explained the nature of the conversation she said she had with police. She also explained why she said she would not jeopardize her company’s financial future by intentionally conducting an inaccurate survey.

Over the years, much of her firm’s work has been with private companies and organizations, she said, and the accuracy of her surveys is why she has kept her clients over the years.