Polling attitudes towards the "Democratic Party" is truly a waste of time and mental bandwidth.
No one thinks about political parties in America - we think about our leaders. It's really only pollsters who think they need to measure something that doesn't exist IRL.
When we have a Democratic President, this question measures the popularity of our President. When we have a Republican President, this questions measures the unpopularity of their President, and the effort made by elected Democrats to fight back.
Democrats choose our leader every 4 years as our nominee for President - then voters decide whether to vote for or against our nominee. That is how our party favorability is measured by voters - by the success or failure of our Presidential nominee.
No one looks back at 2024 and says "the Democratic Party lost" - we say Kamala Harris lost (or Joe Biden had too many negatives for Harris to overcome).
Please distinguish between "politically active party members" and "politically active people who regularly vote and work for Democratic candidates." We're involved in campaigns and we may be listed as Democrats on the voting rolls, but we often aren't, and don't consider ourselves, "party members." In MA, one can be "Unenrolled" and vote in any party's primary. I did this for decades. In 2016, I worked for several local Democratic candidates and of course was horrified that Trump got elected. I was then recruited to help revive the local Dem group, so I changed my registration to Democrat, served as the group's secretary for six years, and was a delegate to two or three state Dem conventions.
Short version: The local group was, and is, great, but I was so seriously disillusioned by the state Democratic Party that I changed back to being Unenrolled after I left office. However, the story isn't over yet, because I got recruited to help revive my new town's town committee, reregistered as a Democrat, and am once again a delegate to the state convention. We'll see how it goes. But the widespread low opinion of the Democratic *Party* from people who reliably vote Democratic doesn't surprise me at all.
Yeah the approve / disapprove, or support / do not support numbers for Jeffferies and Shumer, et al., are going to be worse than the result at the ballot box because there's folks like me who (1) are forced to vote for the Dems as the least worst option, (2) are more pragmatic than idealistic so will always vote for the least worst option, (3) still routinely tell pollsters that the Dem's can go suck an egg.
No one has summarized it better than Tim Kreider's political cartoon from 24 years ago (!): "The Choice"
Krieder presents the choice as a ballot with two columns for "Democrats" and "Republicans," featuring caricatures and cynical captions for each.
Under the Democrats column is a caricature of a woman with a wide, toothy grin. The text below reads: "-Oh, lordy, I guess we'd do just about anything if you thought you might vote for us. We could bomb some foreigners if you want! Do you really think you will?"
Under the Republicans column is a caricature of a heavy-set man in a suit with a smug expression. The text below reads: "-More money for us" and "-Fuck you."
"Neither group is necessarily enthusiastic about Democrats. But both are currently heavily voting against Republicans. According to the CNN poll, 79% of voters who plan to support Democrats say their vote is a message of opposition to Trump."
It really does drive me nuts that people hate Democrats but have no idea why. Dems have done SO MUCH MORE for working class people (pro-union, pro-equality, pro-equity, pro-diversity, pro-education, pro-taxing the rich, pro-healthcare for all, pro-(legal)immigration.) If people just paid attention in their history class, they would know these truths.
SIGH.
Regardless, I hope Democratic strategists are reading Mr. Morris's research so they can come up with a party platform and policy goals that will deliver relief to the middle- and working-classes.
They need to do it with a sledgehammer of publicity so that maybe, just maybe, those people who don't think ideology is something they should care about might realize just how directly public policy affects the quality of their daily lives.
Republicans, especially Trump, do a great job of thumping their chests about their accomplishments (whether or not it's actually them who accomplished it).
Obama, and especially Biden, did a terrible job of that. "My record speaks for itself" is BS! Your record doesn't speak. You have to thump your chest and advertise your accomplishments to the public!
I'm not at all sure that "people hate Democrats." I do believe that many people who vote regularly, maybe exclusively, for Democratic candidates are disgusted by the Democratic *Party*. I'm politically savvy enough to know that the "Democratic Party" isn't monolithic, that some state parties are more effective than others, and that the outside-the-Beltway national organizations (representing Dem attorneys general, secretaries of state, and governors) have been doing good work. But what non-political-junkies hear is probably mostly about Schumer, Jeffries, and the congressional leadership, so I'm not surprised by the low ratings.
We really need to get a much better handle on what behaviors all the people who believe the Dems are weak/ineffectual would want to see. On one hand, this could be folks who don’t understand how few levers a party that’s completely out of power actually has at the federal level. On the other hand, it could be voters who recognize the existential threat of Trump and the whole Project 2025 crowd. This might a group asking for the Democratic leadership to go well beyond traditional politics and start behaving as a true opposition movement. Parsing some of this out might be very helpful as the Dems select candidates and start to move into the more serious portion of the election cycle.
This is obviously a “researchable” question so I’m hoping Elliott can work his magic and come up with a few questions that could provide the needed insights.
I think what happened in Minneapolis (way more than federal “overreach”) and the community solidarity that followed (neighbors protecting neighbors) meaningfully shifted broad swaths of public opinion to hold a negative view of the agencies involved in the crackdown and T’s immigration “policies” (more like mass detention/abduction and deportation). People were horrified at what happened and realized it could happen to them. Green cards and citizenship were somewhat irrelevant as they lost their protective value dividing Americans into one protected world and one very dangerous, lawless one. In a similar way, the Supreme Court Justices have their own birthright citizenship stories - some of them would not be citizens without birthright citizenship. They don’t want to take away their own rights. While the decision is TBD, oral arguments point that way. My broad argument is that when rights are truly universal and are broadly being trampled upon AND Democrats in Congress seem to be holding together to demand real reforms for once, then people take notice.
I am interested in your opinion of the reliability of polls of protests, an NBC/StarTribune poll a couple months ago showed 25% participation in the organizing/protest in Minneapolis and the organizers of No Kings protest said they were interested in doing a poll of participation, wondering if there is any history of polling of protests movements, and your opinions of how much of a good use of polling they are.
I've lived in Kansas since the beginning of the Bush administration. When Bush became unpopular (wars, tax cuts, etc), I saw a lot of Republicans switch to independent or Libertarian, even though they still voted mostly for Republicans.
Now I'm hearing people are just not going to turn out, because they're so disgusted with the Republicans, they want them to lose.
If we could get a few percent of them to vote for Democrats, we might make a dent in the state supermajority. Both the House Speaker and the Senate president are running for other offices, so if we could make sure they don't win, we're on our way!
As you, I think, often point out, the voting public doesn't divide up into just members of the Democratic and Republican parties, with Independents now forming the largest percentage of the electorate. It would be very helpful if 1) they were included, and /or 2) the breakdown included what percentage of the voting public (last election or likely) the various categories include.
The far left will forever move the goal posts because the smugness of being accusing both parties of corporatism is more important than achieving victories. You can't count on them for anything.
Polling attitudes towards the "Democratic Party" is truly a waste of time and mental bandwidth.
No one thinks about political parties in America - we think about our leaders. It's really only pollsters who think they need to measure something that doesn't exist IRL.
When we have a Democratic President, this question measures the popularity of our President. When we have a Republican President, this questions measures the unpopularity of their President, and the effort made by elected Democrats to fight back.
Democrats choose our leader every 4 years as our nominee for President - then voters decide whether to vote for or against our nominee. That is how our party favorability is measured by voters - by the success or failure of our Presidential nominee.
No one looks back at 2024 and says "the Democratic Party lost" - we say Kamala Harris lost (or Joe Biden had too many negatives for Harris to overcome).
I'm sorry you were ill earlier this week, and I hope you are feeling better.
Please distinguish between "politically active party members" and "politically active people who regularly vote and work for Democratic candidates." We're involved in campaigns and we may be listed as Democrats on the voting rolls, but we often aren't, and don't consider ourselves, "party members." In MA, one can be "Unenrolled" and vote in any party's primary. I did this for decades. In 2016, I worked for several local Democratic candidates and of course was horrified that Trump got elected. I was then recruited to help revive the local Dem group, so I changed my registration to Democrat, served as the group's secretary for six years, and was a delegate to two or three state Dem conventions.
Short version: The local group was, and is, great, but I was so seriously disillusioned by the state Democratic Party that I changed back to being Unenrolled after I left office. However, the story isn't over yet, because I got recruited to help revive my new town's town committee, reregistered as a Democrat, and am once again a delegate to the state convention. We'll see how it goes. But the widespread low opinion of the Democratic *Party* from people who reliably vote Democratic doesn't surprise me at all.
Yeah the approve / disapprove, or support / do not support numbers for Jeffferies and Shumer, et al., are going to be worse than the result at the ballot box because there's folks like me who (1) are forced to vote for the Dems as the least worst option, (2) are more pragmatic than idealistic so will always vote for the least worst option, (3) still routinely tell pollsters that the Dem's can go suck an egg.
No one has summarized it better than Tim Kreider's political cartoon from 24 years ago (!): "The Choice"
Tim Krieder, "The Choice," 2002: https://geotrickster.com/2025/06/08/the-worst-number-of-parties-is-two/
Krieder presents the choice as a ballot with two columns for "Democrats" and "Republicans," featuring caricatures and cynical captions for each.
Under the Democrats column is a caricature of a woman with a wide, toothy grin. The text below reads: "-Oh, lordy, I guess we'd do just about anything if you thought you might vote for us. We could bomb some foreigners if you want! Do you really think you will?"
Under the Republicans column is a caricature of a heavy-set man in a suit with a smug expression. The text below reads: "-More money for us" and "-Fuck you."
Could it be liberals are rewarding Democrats for finally fighting? They held on the budget.
"Neither group is necessarily enthusiastic about Democrats. But both are currently heavily voting against Republicans. According to the CNN poll, 79% of voters who plan to support Democrats say their vote is a message of opposition to Trump."
It really does drive me nuts that people hate Democrats but have no idea why. Dems have done SO MUCH MORE for working class people (pro-union, pro-equality, pro-equity, pro-diversity, pro-education, pro-taxing the rich, pro-healthcare for all, pro-(legal)immigration.) If people just paid attention in their history class, they would know these truths.
SIGH.
Regardless, I hope Democratic strategists are reading Mr. Morris's research so they can come up with a party platform and policy goals that will deliver relief to the middle- and working-classes.
They need to do it with a sledgehammer of publicity so that maybe, just maybe, those people who don't think ideology is something they should care about might realize just how directly public policy affects the quality of their daily lives.
And always has.
Republicans, especially Trump, do a great job of thumping their chests about their accomplishments (whether or not it's actually them who accomplished it).
Obama, and especially Biden, did a terrible job of that. "My record speaks for itself" is BS! Your record doesn't speak. You have to thump your chest and advertise your accomplishments to the public!
Mamdani is doing that right now in NYC. Finally.
I'm not at all sure that "people hate Democrats." I do believe that many people who vote regularly, maybe exclusively, for Democratic candidates are disgusted by the Democratic *Party*. I'm politically savvy enough to know that the "Democratic Party" isn't monolithic, that some state parties are more effective than others, and that the outside-the-Beltway national organizations (representing Dem attorneys general, secretaries of state, and governors) have been doing good work. But what non-political-junkies hear is probably mostly about Schumer, Jeffries, and the congressional leadership, so I'm not surprised by the low ratings.
We really need to get a much better handle on what behaviors all the people who believe the Dems are weak/ineffectual would want to see. On one hand, this could be folks who don’t understand how few levers a party that’s completely out of power actually has at the federal level. On the other hand, it could be voters who recognize the existential threat of Trump and the whole Project 2025 crowd. This might a group asking for the Democratic leadership to go well beyond traditional politics and start behaving as a true opposition movement. Parsing some of this out might be very helpful as the Dems select candidates and start to move into the more serious portion of the election cycle.
This is obviously a “researchable” question so I’m hoping Elliott can work his magic and come up with a few questions that could provide the needed insights.
I think what happened in Minneapolis (way more than federal “overreach”) and the community solidarity that followed (neighbors protecting neighbors) meaningfully shifted broad swaths of public opinion to hold a negative view of the agencies involved in the crackdown and T’s immigration “policies” (more like mass detention/abduction and deportation). People were horrified at what happened and realized it could happen to them. Green cards and citizenship were somewhat irrelevant as they lost their protective value dividing Americans into one protected world and one very dangerous, lawless one. In a similar way, the Supreme Court Justices have their own birthright citizenship stories - some of them would not be citizens without birthright citizenship. They don’t want to take away their own rights. While the decision is TBD, oral arguments point that way. My broad argument is that when rights are truly universal and are broadly being trampled upon AND Democrats in Congress seem to be holding together to demand real reforms for once, then people take notice.
I am interested in your opinion of the reliability of polls of protests, an NBC/StarTribune poll a couple months ago showed 25% participation in the organizing/protest in Minneapolis and the organizers of No Kings protest said they were interested in doing a poll of participation, wondering if there is any history of polling of protests movements, and your opinions of how much of a good use of polling they are.
I've lived in Kansas since the beginning of the Bush administration. When Bush became unpopular (wars, tax cuts, etc), I saw a lot of Republicans switch to independent or Libertarian, even though they still voted mostly for Republicans.
Now I'm hearing people are just not going to turn out, because they're so disgusted with the Republicans, they want them to lose.
If we could get a few percent of them to vote for Democrats, we might make a dent in the state supermajority. Both the House Speaker and the Senate president are running for other offices, so if we could make sure they don't win, we're on our way!
Fingers crossed!!
Thanks. Being Kansas, the outcome is doubtful, but Trump can't stop shooting himself in the foot, so I'm hopeful!
As you, I think, often point out, the voting public doesn't divide up into just members of the Democratic and Republican parties, with Independents now forming the largest percentage of the electorate. It would be very helpful if 1) they were included, and /or 2) the breakdown included what percentage of the voting public (last election or likely) the various categories include.
Fair!
The far left will forever move the goal posts because the smugness of being accusing both parties of corporatism is more important than achieving victories. You can't count on them for anything.