The Trump campaign predicted biased polls attempting to show bloated support for Vice President Kamala Harris days before Des Moines Register pollster Ann Selzer's election-eve poll showed her leading in the red state.
Turns out the campaign data scientists were right and Selzer's portrayal of the electorate was wrong by 16 points — so wrong Selzer has retired as the pollster for the famed Iowa Poll.
Still, Selzer contends she planned to retire even after the embarrassment of her 11th-hour poll showing Harris plus-3 in an Iowa general election she would ultimately lose to Trump by nearly 14 points (56%-42.7%).
"Polling is a science of estimation, and science has a way of periodically humbling the scientist," Selzer wrote for the Register, announcing her departure she says was planned before the election. "So, I'm humbled, yet always willing to learn from unexpected findings.
"My work will continue for current clients and for clients yet to come. In addition, I'm thinking about how to put other talents to work for the benefit of new clients.
"My integrity means a lot to me. To those who have questioned it, there are likely no words to dissuade."
Gannett Media Chief Content Officer Kristin Roberts vows the once-bellwether Iowa oll will "evolve as we find new ways to accurately capture public sentiment and the pulse of Iowans on state and national issues," she told CNN in a statement.
"Our mission is to provide trusted news and content to our readers and the public," she continued. "We did not deliver on that promise when we shared results of the last Des Moines Register Iowa Poll, which did not accurately capture the outcome of the presidential election."
Critics saw it differently.
"When you become the laughingstock of the profession, it is time to seek 'other ventures,'" conservative documentarian Dinesh D'Souza wrote Sunday on X.
"The Democrats won't miss her at all. Her usefulness to them is at an end."
An Illinois podcast called Selzer's last poll "deliberate propaganda."
"Ann Selzer's retirement announcement confirms what we already knew: The Harris +3 was deliberate propaganda," David Chapman wrote on X.
Sources inside the Trump campaign the Friday before the election predicted outlier polls would attempt to show bloated support for Harris in an attempt to either boost her Election-Day voter turnout in key battleground states or discourage Trump voters from turning out.
The off-the-record prediction wound up going on the record just two days later that Sunday with the Iowa Poll and then just two more days later in a historic Electoral College victory for President-elect Donald Trump.