YouGov just released a new poll claiming 18% of Americans support their state seceding. If this sounds familiar, it should.
The Texas Nationalist Movement has spent years exposing the fundamental flaws in polling on independence questions. We’ve documented how academic polls dramatically overrepresent urban Democrats while excluding rural Texans and conservatives. We’ve shown how question wording can swing results from 40% to 60% support depending on how the question is framed. We’ve pointed out that sampling methods often produce results designed to generate headlines rather than reflect reality.
Now YouGov is at it again with their latest “national secession poll.”
The math doesn’t add up. YouGov surveyed 26,590 adults nationwide. Split across 50 states, that’s roughly 500 respondents per state — far below statistical significance. YouGov then uses modeling and weighting to estimate state-level opinions from this small sample. That approach can miss real differences between states, or amplify them where they don’t exist.
This is the same approach we criticized in Dr. Thomas R. Brooks’ December 2024 study, which claimed 82% of Texans oppose independence — a finding that wildly contradicted other independent polling. As we noted at the time, that study relied heavily on undergraduate students and urban populations, nearly doubled Democrat respondents compared to Republicans, and failed to properly weight data to match Texas’s actual demographics.
YouGov has the same problem: they’re modeling opinions from too small a sample, then presenting those models as authoritative data.
Here’s what we know is real:
- The Texas Nationalist Movement has grown to over 600,000 registered supporters
- County organizations are active across Texas
- Candidates are signing the Texas First Pledge
- The Texas GOP platform includes TEXIT referendum planks
Here’s what’s not real: Any poll that claims to measure Texan attitudes on independence with 500 respondents and statistical modeling.
As we’ve said before, no poll or survey, no matter how well or poorly conducted, can substitute for a binding vote by the people of Texas. The only poll that truly counts is the one where Texans enter their local polling places and decide their own future.
Polls come and go. The movement endures.
