Fox News co-hosts battle over meaning of Trump polls, crowd size

After arguing on-air with her Fox News co-host, former White House press secretary Dana Perino took her argument online Wednesday night to get “a few things off of my chest.”

Earlier in the day, Perino objected to an argument from Eric Bolling, her co-host on “The Five,” who made an argument favored by Donald Trump’s campaign, that the impressive turnout at the Manhattan billionaire’s rallies are a better indicator of support than polls that show Trump losing.


“These polls, Dana, honestly, we have to stop with these polls. They’re insane with the polls,” Bolling said. “Just look at what’s going on. You look at a Trump rally, and there’s 12, 15,000, 10,000 people, and then you look at Hillary Clinton and you have, I don’t know, 1,500, 2,000, but that speaks volumes to me versus a poll 82 days out.”

“You can’t. You cannot believe, Eric,” Perino responded before Bolling was even finished speaking. “It’s a real disservice to his supporters to lie to them that those polls don’t matter. You cannot take 12,000 people at a rally that are your definite supporters, they are going to show up the campaign, and then say the polls are wrong. It’s just not fair. It’s not fair to them.”

Bolling went on to add that “polls really shouldn’t matter, or shouldn’t ever matter” because poll respondents answering a phone call are not showing the same level of enthusiasm as someone who shows up at a campaign rally. Perino wrote on Twitter that she “won’t be party to delusion that crowds > established polls” and said it does a disservice to GOP voters to tell them anything but the truth.

“When it comes to political analysis, I make you a promise — I will never lie to you,” Perino wrote in the first of a 12-tweet flurry. “Many of you write, wanting me to tell you GOOD things about the gop chances this year. I wish I could do that. But I WILL NOT LIE TO YOU.”

“In 2012, I fell for ‘the polls are wrong’ mantra. I felt sick election night, realizing I'd been suckered into a fall sense of complacency,” she continued. “Romney was not going to win in spite of the ‘rigged polls’ - and I vowed that night that I would NEVER EVER fall for that again.”

In subsequent posts, Perino wrote that by her estimation, the Democrats start with 242 of the 270 Electoral College votes they need to win the White House and “even I can to that math — it isn’t hard.” She added that she expects the race to tighten significantly after Labor Day but added that the campaign’s remaining 11 weeks will pass quickly. Trump “can’t win a general election with the current state of the campaign,” Perino wrote.

“I will not lie to you about the state of this race. I won't do it. No amount of peer pressure digital or otherwise can move me,” she wrote, listing off names she had been called by viewers, a list that includes 'Debbie Downer,' 'Negative Nancy' and a 'Pragmatic Snob."

“Maybe you want the party to be at risk. Maybe it SHOULD be at risk. But I won't be a party to delusion that crowds > established polls," Perino wrote, before saying she and her dog, Jasper, were retiring for the night.

And with that, I'm taking NyQuil, sniffing some Afrin, and GOING TO BED WITH JASPER! (peter is away on business!!) — Dana Perino (@DanaPerino) August 18, 2016