Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, who once boasted about his robust poll numbers, has turned to criticizing them as ineffective and “rigged” now that most show his rival, Democrat Hillary Clinton, with a commanding lead.

On Monday, the real estate tycoon turned politician accused the Democratic Party of creating fake polls to undermine his bid for the White House but said that he’ll win regardless.

Trump made the dubious claim in a morning tweet –– the latest example of his pattern of messages of mistrust and skepticism aimed at all things that portray his campaign efforts in a negative light.

Major story that the Dems are making up phony polls in order to suppress the the Trump . We are going to WIN! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 24, 2016





He also tweeted, “Media in the tank for Clinton but Trump will win!” and “We are winning and the press is refusing to report it.”

Monday morning on “The Chad Adams Show,” a conservative radio program in North Carolina, Trump said that pollsters focused on Democrats when asking about which candidate won the second and third debates.

“All the fair polls have us winning. The oversampled polls, meaning they take it out of Democrats, that’s a different story,” he said.

According to Trump, “everyone uniformly” said that he won the debates, so pollsters must be sampling people who never would have considered voting for him on the grounds that he’s a conservative Republican.

“It was a poll of Democrats and watchers of CNN, and it had her winning the debate,” Trump said, referring to Clinton only as “her,” as he did in the third debate. “And you know, I know when I win and lose. I think I’m pretty good at that stuff. And that was an easy victory in the debate. She said so many things that were so bad and were so bad for people.”

Though his pathway to victory appears to have greatly narrowed, Trump has continued to cherry-pick advantageous polls and promote their results on social media. Two recent national polls — from Investor’s Business Daily and Rasmussen — give Trump a slight lead on Clinton.

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Get out to VOTE on 11/8/2016- and we will #DrainTheSwamp!

RASMUSSEN NATIONAL

Trump 43%

Clinton 41% pic.twitter.com/jIOR7Bq816 — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 24, 2016





A new ABC News/Washington Post poll shows Clinton leading Trump by 12 percentage points (50 to 38 percent). To date, that’s her highest support and his lowest in that specific poll. Her lead is even stronger among women, where she is ahead by 20 percentage points (55-35 percent).

His support among both men and women dropped off after the leaked hot-mic conversation, in which he bragged about groping women, led to at least a dozen women accusing him of sexual misconduct. In the ABC/Post poll, 71 percent of women and 67 percent of men disapprove of how he handled questions about his past behavior with women.

On Sunday, at a rally in Naples, Fla., the beleaguered candidate lambasted the many polls that show Clinton leading. He was particularly aggrieved by the results that show his trouble with female voters.

“I’ll tell you what, we’re doing well in the polls. But you know, I really think those polls are very inaccurate when it comes to women. I think we’re doing better with women than with men,” Trump told the crowd. “So we’re setting records with men, but I want to set records with women. And I hate to tell the men this, but if I could swap, I’d swap you out so fast.”

Many female supporters at the Collier County Fairgrounds, including several seated behind Trump, were waving pink “Women for Trump” signs.

“You people in Naples, you have a lot of energy. This is fantastic,” he said. “And I like those pink signs the best! I hate to tell you.”

According to Real Clear Politics, which aggregates various polls, the Republican stronghold of Texas is now a tossup, meaning it could go either way. Trump is only leading Clinton 43.6 percent to 38.8 percent in Texas. A Clinton victory there would mark the first time a Democrat clinched the Lone Star State since 1976 when Jimmy Carter nearly swept the South (losing only Virginia and Oklahoma to incumbent Gerald Ford).