About election poll

Trump continues flood of lawsuits against media companies

Trump was recently named Person of the Year by Time.(Bild: AFP/Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

According to media reports, future US President Donald Trump is suing a polling institute as well as a regional newspaper and its publisher. The reason: the publication of a voter survey in the US state shortly before the presidential election.

In the lawsuit, Trump accuses the regional newspaper "The Des Moines Register" and the polling institute of misleading all voters in Iowa and the USA through the poll.

The aim was to "improperly influence the outcome of the 2024 presidential election", as several media outlets quote from the lawsuit. It was "intentional".

What happened?
A few days before the US elections, the poll caused quite a stir: According to it, Democrat Kamala Harris was ahead of her rival Trump in the conservative state.

In the survey conducted by the regional newspaper "The Des Moines Register" in collaboration with the polling institute Selzer & Company, 47% of respondents said they would vote for Harris - 44% would vote for Trump. Other polls saw Trump in the lead. He ultimately won the state with a lead of around 13 percentage points.

Pollster announced her withdrawal
The owner of the polling institute, Ann Selzer, is considered a respected pollster in the USA. After the election, she announced her retirement from the business. "Would I have liked to have made this announcement after a final poll that matched the election day results? Yes, of course," she wrote. Trump had already threatened legal action at a press conference on Monday.

"It costs a lot of money, but we have to straighten out the press. Our press is very corrupt, almost as corrupt as our elections." During the election campaign, he had repeatedly described polls from which he won nothing as falsified.

Broadcaster defends reporting
A spokeswoman for the newspaper's parent company, Gannett, told CNN: "We stand by our reporting in this matter and believe this lawsuit is without merit." According to the broadcaster, the regional newspaper stated that the pre-election poll did not reflect the election result. The full data and technical explanations for the poll have been published.

No longer friends: Trump and presenter Stephanopoulos(Bild: AFP/MANDEL NGAN)

Trump regularly rails against the media and also takes legal action against them. For example, he has sued the US broadcaster CBS for damages. He accuses the media company of manipulating an interview with his opponent Harris in favor of the Democrat. The broadcaster rejected the allegations of manipulation. At the weekend, Trump and the broadcaster ABC also settled a lawsuit - ABC agreed to pay 15 million US dollars. The Republican had sued the broadcaster and its presenter George Stephanopoulos for defamation.