On October 18 on News from CNN, on-screen text falsely suggested that President George W. Bush's favorable rating had risen to 55 percent in multiple polls. Later, on CNN's Inside Politics, host Judy Woodruff selectively cited polls to assert that “the polls seem to be moving in President Bush's favor.”

The on-screen text, which aired on News from CNN during a report by CNN senior political analyst Bill Schneider, read, “Polls: Bush's favorability rating rose from 51% to 55%.” But only one poll conducted in whole or in part since the conclusion of the debates, the CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll, shows Bush's favorable rating that high. A Washington Post tracking poll conducted October 12-14 gave Bush a 50 percent favorable rating, a TIME magazine poll conducted October 14-15 placed Bush's favorability at 49 percent, and RealClearPolitics.com reported that a Newsweek poll conducted October 14-15 rated Bush's favorability at 51 percent.

On Inside Politics, Woodruff gave an assessment of the presidential race by combining the results of five recent polls -- CNN/USA Today/Gallup, Newsweek, TIME magazine, ABC/Washington Post, and IBD/TIPP -- into a “poll of polls” of likely voters. According to that assessment, Bush leads Senator John Kerry 50 percent to 45 percent, leading Woodruff to ask, “What happened to that lift that John Kerry got from the debates?” Perhaps a similar assessment led The Note, the daily briefing from the ABC News political unit, to conclude that “By nearly every credible indication available, President Bush seems to have moved, post-debates, into a small but potentially meaningful lead over Senator Kerry.”

But Woodruff and ABC neglected to consider three polls that show different results -- a Zogby poll conducted October 15-17 that showed Bush and Kerry each with 45 percent of the vote; Rasmussen's daily tracking poll from October 18 that puts the race even at 47 percent each; and a survey conducted October 14-16 by Democracy Corps (a nonprofit polling company whose principals are Democrats) that gave Kerry a 48 percent to 45 percent lead over Bush.