Is the liberal data machine crumbling? ABC News has delivered a devastating blow to progressive political analysis by abruptly shutting down FiveThirtyEight, a once-influential polling site known for consistently favoring Democratic candidates and giving Kamala Harris the edge over Donald Trump in the last presidential race.
At a glance:
• ABC News has shut down FiveThirtyEight as part of broader layoffs affecting approximately 200 employees
• All 15 FiveThirtyEight employees were terminated and learned of their layoffs from a Wall Street Journal report
• The site had incorrectly predicted Kamala Harris had a better chance than Donald Trump in the recent election
• Trump won the electoral college 312-226 and the popular vote when FiveThirtyEight had projected Harris would win both
• The shutdown signals a major shift in the media landscape as legacy polling organizations lose influence
FiveThirtyEight Falls After Failed Election Predictions
ABC News abruptly shut down FiveThirtyEight, the data-focused news site known for its political analysis and polling aggregation. And with it goes one of the worst, most bias, and most unreliable “polling” sites in the country.
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The closure came as part of a larger round of layoffs affecting approximately 200 employees, or nearly 6% of ABC News and Disney Entertainment Networks’ workforce.
All 15 remaining FiveThirtyEight employees were terminated in a brief 15-minute meeting where ABC News President Almin Karamehmedovic read from a prepared statement without taking questions. Following the meeting, staff immediately lost access to ABC News systems, and the FiveThirtyEight website was taken offline.
The once-influential site had been steadily declining since Founder Nate Silver left two years ago, with its workforce shrinking from 35 employees in 2023 to just 15 at the time of closure. FiveThirtyEight’s demise follows a pattern of embarrassing polling failures, most notably its inaccurate prediction that Kamala Harris had a better chance of defeating Donald Trump in the recent presidential election.
Liberal Polling Failures Exposed
FiveThirtyEight had boldly claimed Harris held a 50% chance of winning against Trump’s 49% and gave her a whopping 71% chance of winning the national popular vote. These predictions proved wildly inaccurate when Trump decisively won the electoral college 312-226 and the national popular vote with 49.9% to Harris’ 48.4%.
Nate Silver, who founded the site before departing, had incorrectly suggested Harris could win Florida, a state Trump ultimately won by an overwhelming 13 points. The site’s presidential approval ratings consistently showed decreasing support for Trump, while other polling aggregators like RealClearPolitics displayed more stable and accurate numbers.
“Seems as if 538 is being shut down because the polling games and information operations they long played on behalf of Democrats are no longer as effective as they need to be to justify their existence,” noted Mollie Hemingway, a prominent conservative commentator. This statement reflects growing conservative sentiment that FiveThirtyEight operated with a liberal bias in its polling methodology.
The FiveThirtyEight closure is part of a larger restructuring at ABC News, where several major programs are being consolidated. The network plans to merge 20/20 and Nightline into one program, while Good Morning America’s three hours of branded shows will operate under a single production team.
