Eric Zemmour favored in an erroneous survey presented by CNEWS chain

The information chain showed a table at presentation and misleading data. It totaled 106% of voting intentions in the presidential election of 2022 and simultaneously test three candidates for the investiture of Republicans.

Le Monde with AFP

While the presidential precamp is full, the CNEWS continuous information chain was pinned, Thursday, October 28, by the Survey Board. He has criticized him for favoring Eric Zemmour in a survey broadcast on Wednesday, presentation and erroneous data.

In the emission “The hour of pros 2”, the table thus showed Emmanuel Macron in the lead with 23% of the voting intentions. Behind him filled Mr. Zemmour at 17%, Marine Le Pen at 16% and Xavier Bertrand at 14%. In the same survey extract, Valérie Pécresse and Jean-Luc Mélenchon were both 10% of the voting intentions, then Michel Barnier at 8% and Yannick Jadot at 5%. For a total of 103% voting intentions, then 106% after the chain returned to Mr. Jadot the three points she had amputated at first.

An error due, as explains the Communiqué of the independent administrative authority , to the presentation of the percentages of voting intentions obtained by three candidates for the investiture of Republicans for the presidential election – Mr. Bertrand, M Pécresse and Mr. Barnier -, for which “the Institute did not carry out a survey to test the hypothesis of their simultaneous nominations”.

“circumspection” and “CAUTION” against polls

In addition, the channel failed to display the margins of uncertainty of the survey. “In these circumstances, such a table, which does not correspond to a survey conducted in accordance with the law of 19 July 1977, therefore can not be presented as an excerpt from a survey,” the Commission.

This last note another misleading inaccuracy. The table broadcast by the chain was for title “presidential: E. Zemmour up”, withdrawing the putative candidate between 17 and 18% of the voting intentions (with a margin of uncertainty of 2.1%). An estimate “exactly identical to [the one] of the two previous waves of this institute when he tests the same assumptions,” says the Commission, inviting “the greatest circumspection”.

While the polls and their relevance are at the heart of the debates around the presidential precamp, the survey commission “calls for everyone on the prudence that should be adopted with the reading of certain media” and the need to check estimates on the site of the institutes mentioned.

/Media reports.