The U.S. Demographic Difference Between Two Parties in 1952, 2020, and 2020: An Analysis by the American National Election Studies (ANCS)

There are long-term trends. The American National Election Studies asked people if there were any differences in what the Republicans and Democrats stood for. The concern at the time was that parties were local institutions, lacking national identities, organization and discipline — and that because of this, they were letting voters down by not being able to speak to the national issues of the day. 50 percent of Americans in 1952 thought there were differences between the parties. The share went up from 63 percent in 1984 to 63 percent in 2004. In 2020, the last year the study asked the question, roughly 90 percent of Americans saw important differences between what the parties stood for. People understand that there are two different versions of the world.

Sixty-two percent of Democrats said they have already voted or plan to do so, while 46% of Republicans said so. A large majority of Republicans plan to cast their votes in person.

The demographic divides of the poll suggest that core Democratic groups such as younger voters, Black and Latino voters, and even to some degree women, are less enthusiastic about Democratic candidates than they have been in the past. A CNN Poll of registered voters found that half of women favored Democratic candidates in their district, but the figure went up to 53% in October. Among voters of color, 69% backed Democrats then but 59% do now. Latino voters break 52% for the Democrats, 23% for the Republican and 21% say they support neither candidate. Black voters split evenly between Democrats and Republicans. And among voters younger than the age of 45, Democrats held a 15-point advantage in 2018 compared with just 8 points now. Likely voters in each of these groups currently tilt a bit more Democratic than registered voters, but motivation to vote among younger voters and voters of color is markedly lower than among older voters or White voters.

Predictably, it’s different when looking at preferences by party — slightly more than half of Republicans and 40% of independents said inflation was their top voting issue, but for Democrats, it was preserving democracy (42%) followed by abortion (22%).

The poll results showed that views of the economy remained negative, but that they had rebounded from summer lows. Democrats and independents are less likely to consider the economy or inflation because of that shift. The issue priorities have been consistent this year, but the wide gap in them has grown due to the shift.

But preserving democracy and abortion have also been key and hugely motivating factors, as former President Trump, whom the poll found is equally unpopular as Biden, has weighed in heavily in these elections. He’s endorsed scores of candidates, many of whom have emulated him, perpetuated his election lies and struggled in purple states.

The new CNN Poll was conducted by SSRS on September 3 through October 5 among a random national sample of 1,982 adults initially reached by mail, including 1,577 registered voters and 1,198 likely voters. A live interviewer was used to conduct the online and telephone surveys. The margin of sampling error of the results is plus or minus 3 percentage points among registered voters and 3.5 percentage points among likely voters. The 50 competitive congressional districts are selected based on publicly available race ratings at the time the sample was chosen. There is an error margin of plus or minus a point among 540 registered voters and 484 likely voters. The weighted subset was designed to represent the proper share of the adult population of the United States.

Slade: Those seeking power certainly want people to feel like the stakes are too high not to go along with their demands. Some militant partisans on the other side consider it traitorous not to be with them 100 percent. There is a distinction between where party activists are and where the average voter is. Most Americans aren’t very invested in their red-blue identities.

Leibovitz: I agree. It is so interesting to me that the number of people who voted for Barack Obama in 2012 and then Donald Trump in 2016 are so far off. That is telling us that Democrat, Republican aren’t really important anymore.

This is an example of how political professionals and people look at the same things. There’s no place for the Bernie-Cruz sympathizer in normal political typologies! But you see in polls right now not just Georgians who might back Brian Kemp for governor in Georgia and Raphael Warnock for senator but also Arizonans who might vote for Mark Kelly and Kari Lake — a stranger combination.

Democrats had a great summer. A surge in voter registration was caused by the Dobbs decision. Voters handed Democrats a string of sweet victories in unlikely places — Alaska and Kansas, and good news in upstate New York.

The poll contained very large numbers. The Democrats expected abortion rights to be a big issue and that they would gain the support of female voters. It doesn’t seem to be working. Over the past month, the gender gap, which used to favor Democrats, has evaporated. In September, women who identified as independent voters favored Democrats by 14 points. Now they favor Republicans by 18 percentage points.

Look at where the parties spend their money to understand how they think the campaign is going. The Washington Post reported last week that Democrats are giving money to House districts that Joe Biden won in the 2020 election. Politico’s election forecast, for example, now rates the races in California’s 13th District and Oregon’s Sixth District as tossups. Two years ago, according to Politico, he won those areas by 11 and 14 points.

With inflation persistently high, Republican enthusiasm has outpaced Democrats’ as more voters begin tuning into the election. Democrats are gaining in their enthusiasm levels but Republicans have increased theirs more in that time.

A set of countervailing political forces may have contributed to the closeness of this year’s midterm elections, according to the​ current results of the national exit poll conducted for CNN and other news networks by Edison Research. It remains uncertain which party will control either the Senate or the House of Representatives next year, with votes still being counted and key races too early to call.

The poll found that Republican voters were OK with voting for an election denier, as long as they could agree on policy positions, and that it was a good thing because of the current age of hyperpartisanship.

While white women with college degrees, who are an important bloc for Democrats, are among the most enthusiastic to vote, Black voters, Latinos and young voters are among the least.

It’s tied at 42% in this survey, which is bad news for Democrats. They need a lead on that question to do well in the House due to how districts are drawn and with swing districts in the right.

Republicans are trusted by wide margins on inflation (R+20), crime (R+16) and immigration (R+12), the three issues the GOP has focused on most in these elections.

Following the defeat of many prominent 2020 election deniers in this year’s midterms, the GOP’s appetite for such candidates has ticked slightly down: 65% of Republicans and Republican leaners say the party should be accepting of candidates who believe that the 2020 election was stolen, down from 72% in July. The share who say the party should accept candidates who acknowledge the election’s legitimacy is 62%, effectively unchanged since summer.

The majority of Americans have confidence in their local and state government to conduct a fair and accurate election. Republicans were less likely to say so, but still almost two-thirds of them said they do have that confidence despite extreme rhetoric coming from candidates and people like Trump.

Now by a 53%-to-38% margin, they say it’s better for the government to be controlled by the same party. While a majority of Republicans and independents agree with Democrats that their majority is in danger this year, they’re not alone.

Overall, 27% of Americans say they have already voted and another 28% say they plan to vote before Election Day. A majority of people say they will vote in person on Election Day.

What Do We Stand For? The Social Issues of the 21st Century: The Politics of Trump, Nixon, and Shapiro

The first two factors — the sameness within parties and the differences between them — are the result of decades of changes. The passing of the Voting Rights Act in the mid-1960s is believed to have started the political reshuffling of conservatives in the country, resulting in less liberal Republicans and Democrats today than in the past. There has been less common ground between the two parties due to differing opinions on issues like tax cuts and abortion. As these issues drove a wedge between politicians, voters followed.

These trends coincide with how people feel about Republicans and Democrats, so they’re even more important. Substantial fractions of both parties say that members of the other party are more close-minded, unintelligent, immoral or unpatriotic than other Americans, and the gap between how much people like their own party and dislike the other is larger now than it has ever been. This mix adds to the divisive politics of identity-based issues. We’re no longer fighting over tax cuts and deregulation, we’re fighting over who gets to call themselves Americans.

The final component of calcification is partisan parity in the electorate. If the next election offers the real promise of controlling Congress or the White House without changing course, there is little incentive for parties to do so. The incentive to change the rules of elections in order to get a few more votes is created by calcification.

What made the aftermath of 2020 stand out from previous elections was the interaction of calcification with political action. The opposite of Nixon, Gore, and Clinton was done by Mr. Trump. He was adamant that he won. Other partisan leaders echoed his claims of a stolen election, and voters agreed with him that outcomes were turning on very few votes.

The strength of individual candidates may have helped the Democrats win over some voters who didn’t like the president. In New Hampshire, the Democratic incumbent, Maggie Hassan, kept her seat by winning nearly all voters who approved of Biden, and roughly one-fifth of those who disapproved. In Pennsylvania’s gubernatorial race, the projected Democratic winner, Josh Shapiro, picked up roughly one-quarter of commonwealth voters who disapproved of Biden. In a number of races, Democratic candidates won outright among voters who somewhat disapproved of Biden.

But the apparent closeness of the election suggests the midterms weren’t solely a referendum on an unpopular president or a reaction to grim views of the economy. Almost 30% of voters say abortion is their top issue following the Supreme Court reversing the ban on the practice. The 6 in 10 people who felt negatively about the decision were mostly angry. Democrats held a 11 point advantage over the Republicans when it came to whom voters trusted to handle issues related to abortion.

The 2022 exit polls include interviews with thousands of voters, both those who cast a ballot on Election Day and those who voted early or absentee. They can be used to understand the political views of voters in this year’s election. Their results will eventually be weighted against the results of the elections. Even so, exit polls are still polls, with margins for error – which means they’re most useful when treated as estimates, rather than precise measurements. The exit poll numbers will be adjusted to match the final election results.

It remains uncertain which party will control the Senate or the House of Representatives next year, with votes still being counted and key races too early to call. But it’s clear that the “red wave” wished for by Republicans did not materialize in 2022.

CNN Exit Polls: How Americans Disapproved of the Biden-President in Pennsylvania’s G gubernatorial Race

President Biden: Biden’s approval rating was underwater among the electorate, with only about 44% of voters approving, about 55% disapproving and roughly 45% saying they strongly disapproved. Voters were more likely to say Biden’s policies had hurt than helped the country and more likely to say their vote was meant to oppose the president than say it was in support of him.

In Pennsylvania’s gubernatorial race, the projected Democratic winner, Josh Shapiro, picked up roughly one-quarter of commonwealth voters who disapproved of Biden. In many races Democrats won by a wide margin because voters who disapproved of Biden voted for them.

CNN Exit Polls are a combination of in-person interviews with Election Day voters and in-person interviews, telephone and online polls measuring the views of early and absentee by-mail voters. The research was done on behalf of the National Election Pool. Here, you can read more.

The American Perception of the House of Representatives During the January 6 Attack: What Do We Really Want to Know About the Biden Administration?

House leadership is not well liked by the public, but within their own party, the public perception of key figures is generally positive. While 53% of US adults hold an unfavorable opinion of outgoing Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and just 33% have a favorable one, Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents express positive views by a roughly 3 to 1 margin (63% favorable, 20% unfavorable). Far fewer Americans have formed an opinion of incoming House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (64% have either not heard of him or have yet to form an opinion), but Democratic-aligned views are generally positive (33% favorable, 5% unfavorable among Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents). Kevin McCarthy, the leading Republican in the House of Representatives, has a rating that tilts negative among the public with almost half unsure how to feel about him. Among Republicans and Republican leaners, there’s been a shift toward the positive since this summer: 39% now have a favorable view and 16% unfavorable, compared with 19% favorable and 28% unfavorable in CNN’s polling this summer.

Republicans have signaled their intention to open multiple investigations into the Biden administration and have asked the members of the House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol to preserve records and transcripts, suggesting the potential for a counter-investigation. The January 6 attack, and the investigations that followed, are expected to have a largely negative impact on investigations, but are more divided about whether it will affect oversight of the Biden administration.

Only half of Americans think the GOP is too extreme compared to the Democrats, who think it is too extreme, even though both numbers have not changed since last summer.

There were faultlines within the Democratic Party. Democratic-aligned adults younger than 45 are likelier than those 45 and older to see the need for major changes, 42% to 25%. And among those who align with the Democratic Party and think it needs major changes, 14% say the party needs to recruit younger candidates or do more to appeal to young voters.

“The Democratic Party needs new, forthright leadership that will reflect the growing diversity of the American people,” said one respondent to the survey. Another answered, “I don’t mean that the existing Democratic leaders are doing a bad job But it may be the perfect time for a new generation of leaders.

The GOP “needs to dump Trump and return to conservatism,” one respondent to the poll replied, while another wrote, “I feel like my party isn’t doing ANYTHING to help our beloved country.”

While 6% bemoaned gridlock or said the GOP should compromise more, 4% wanted the party to take a stronger stand against Democrats and 5% said it should espouse more conservative positions.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/12/politics/cnn-poll-elections-political-parties/index.html

CNN Poll: Statistical Methodology of a Probability-Based Panel Study of Young Adults: Online and Over-the-Horizon Surveys

This CNN Poll was conducted by SSRS on December 1 through 7 among a random national sample of 1,208 adults drawn from a probability-based panel. The recordings of the surveys were either conducted online or over the phone. The sample’s margin of sampling error is larger for subgroup results compared to the full sample.