At the end of his Rand Paul interview on Sunday, Meet the Press host Chuck Todd asked a bit of a softball. Was Paul frustrated with the media’s obsession with Trump? No kidding, Chuck. Sen. Paul said “I do have a frustration....that we’re being led by the nose and the news media is led by the nose to think that somehow Trump is going to win this because of these polls.”
CHUCK TODD: You know, you started this race as one of the frontrunners. A lot of people thought you were going to be one of the frontrunners at this point in time. You're not there right now. That doesn't mean you won't be at some point. But are you frustrated with how this campaign has turned out? The focus on Trump? What is it that is-- I feel the frustration in reading your tweets. You clearly are. Can you put it into words?
SEN. RAND PAUL: Yeah, the interesting thing is, is that I think the polls are not scientific. A lot of people who follow polls never had any math classes. They don't understand anything about standard error, standard deviation.
CHUCK TODD: You are right about that.
SEN. RAND PAUL: And the problem is that and they've been way wrong. I mean, look, we just had polling in the Kentucky race. And a week before, when they're supposed to be most accurate, they're off 13 points. So if I do have a frustration, it's that we're being led by the nose and the news media is led by the nose to think that somehow Trump is going to win this because of these polls.
The polls don't, I believe capture who's going to actually vote. Look, we have great popularity with students. I had a thousand students at George Washington a few weeks ago, a thousand students at Iowa State. And the thing is, is have you ever met a college student that has answered a presidential poll?
If we turn them out, we're going to shock people like you've never seen. But the problem is, is it's a self-fulfilling cycle. Everybody's reporting in strong for Rubio or this or that. And really, in the end, nobody knows and we ought to have maybe a little bit more of an even approach to how we approach the news.
CHUCK TODD: Well, I'm in favor of wait and see what the voters saying.
SEN. RAND PAUL: Just saying.
CHUCK TODD: Fair enough.
If NBC actually followed what Chuck Todd claims he favors, the campaign coverage would look very different. Instead, it’s been completely Trump-obsessed.
