Not to be a doomer, but I think it’s also important to point out that the Generic Ballot polling isn’t looking nearly as good for Democrats now as it did at this point in 2017. Plus there are people gearing up to primary Dems even in districts like WA-02 that went for Trump.
BTW, GEM is one of the few scholars today who recognize the role Emil Hurja played in the early years of the New Deal. Mary Stuckey at Penn State and David Greenberg at Rutgers are two others. Kudos to him for recognizing my favorite uncle and godfather! FYI, here's a link to my take on Hurja published by the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research at Cornell: https://ropercenter.cornell.edu/emil-hurja
I think when Trump says he doesn’t pay attention or care about polls, he is simply lying. Many other politicians have said similar things in the past, and everyone understands when it’s not Trump that this is just a thing politicians say.
1994 and 2010 were interesting in that despite being very popular themselves, per net approval ratings, the Dems got clobbered in the house. As I recall, in both cases the Rs did a great job of demonizing health insurance reform. The lesson I take from that is either don't touch hot-button issues in the first two years, or else get them done in the first 100 days so that folks can get past the negative hype and perhaps see positive outcomes. Your thoughts on those two wipeouts?
President Clinton and President Obama were unpopular IMO. This is because they were under 50% in the fall of 94 and 2010 per Gallup’s “approval rating” thing they do.
Well, Biden was in -8 territory but he continued to hold the presidency and there is no reason to think that the current occupant of the White House will stop destroying the economy and the democracy.
I hope you're right. Poll numbers aren't stopping Elon Musk and DOGE from slashing through the federal workforce and giving lucrative contracts to themselves and other trump donors, like the contract that just went to Workforce for managing government HR or the contract to Ramp for managing the federal payments system (not to mention, the SpaceX and Starlink contracts). Once these parasites are in our payment systems with no oversight it will be hard to shake them loose....
Also, public opinion polls will make it harder for Republicans to pass the worst version of Trump's Big, beautiful budget but they may not have to if all the illegal freezes of congressionally approved grant money and illegal firing of staff that disburses grants means that they can then use the fact that "these orgs didn't spent their grant money" to permanently lower their budgets in recission in September.
Public opinion also hasn't stopped the administration from closing the part of the DOJ that enforced voter suppression laws and the part of DHS that investigates foreign interference with voting machines. Or for firing the people in charge of looking for theft and corruption from each federal department and the military.
Finally, while public opinion is restraining Congress somewhat, Congress has only passed 5 bills since Trump took office, the only important one being the continuing resolution to keep finding the government. This admin is doing everything by executive order and ignoring court rulings not in their favor while firing or putting on administrative leave any federal employees who won't play along. And then pressuring the press, lawyers, judges, activists and academics who speak out.
In 1935 FDR's approval numbers were underwater. Largely unnoticed today—by historians and the general public alike—Roosevelt was employing at the time the services of arguably the "inventor" of scientific, statistics-based public opinion such as we know it today (Emil Hurja; see the late Melvin Holli's "The Wizard of Washington") to help guide him with readings on public sentiment as he steered a perilous course through the turbulent waters of his first term. In June of that year, at a late-night dinner in the White House with the President, joined by Postmaster General Jim Farley, future Supreme Court justice Felix Frankfurter, then-head of the Securities and Exchange Commission Joseph Kennedy, and Secretary of Commerce Harry Hopkins, Hurja delivered a report on his recent polling of the public's sentiments regarding Roosevelt's manic drive to implement some of the more controversial elements of his New Deal agenda. Hurja basically told FDR, "Mr. President, you're messing up!" Forced to acknowledge a complicated truth he would rather have ignored, Roosevelt changed course dramatically in the coming weeks. Whereas, before that fateful meeting his approval numbers had been at an all-time historic low, FDR soon regained his momentum and secured a landslide victory in the 1936 presidential election. In this one instance, polling numbers played a pivotal role in helping save core elements of the New Deal—elements the current administration is doing its best (worst?) to dismantle. In short, opinion polls have their minuses, but, properly understood, they have their plusses too and ought not to be ignored.
Sadly we are in a post-truth era, when facts have given way to feefees and the independent press has been overrun by "content creators" and "Influencers". Trump's supporters will seal clap and mouth breathe their approval no matter what he does, and the current circling down the drain that the USA is performing will turn into an outright flush into the sewer. I'm so sick of this.
Not to be a doomer, but I think it’s also important to point out that the Generic Ballot polling isn’t looking nearly as good for Democrats now as it did at this point in 2017. Plus there are people gearing up to primary Dems even in districts like WA-02 that went for Trump.
BTW, GEM is one of the few scholars today who recognize the role Emil Hurja played in the early years of the New Deal. Mary Stuckey at Penn State and David Greenberg at Rutgers are two others. Kudos to him for recognizing my favorite uncle and godfather! FYI, here's a link to my take on Hurja published by the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research at Cornell: https://ropercenter.cornell.edu/emil-hurja
Hurja is the O.G.!
Amen to that.
Thanks. Your linear regression is nit very convincing. I assume that the R2 is low. How much is it?
I think when Trump says he doesn’t pay attention or care about polls, he is simply lying. Many other politicians have said similar things in the past, and everyone understands when it’s not Trump that this is just a thing politicians say.
Am I the only one for whom the charts and graphs in this particular newsletter don’t load? Like ever?
If you can share any information about your operating system, email provider, etc, I can forward on to Substack support on your behalf.
1994 and 2010 were interesting in that despite being very popular themselves, per net approval ratings, the Dems got clobbered in the house. As I recall, in both cases the Rs did a great job of demonizing health insurance reform. The lesson I take from that is either don't touch hot-button issues in the first two years, or else get them done in the first 100 days so that folks can get past the negative hype and perhaps see positive outcomes. Your thoughts on those two wipeouts?
President Clinton and President Obama were unpopular IMO. This is because they were under 50% in the fall of 94 and 2010 per Gallup’s “approval rating” thing they do.
Ah yes - the stats that were given were at the 100 day mark, not the two year mark. Thanks for the reminder.
Well, Biden was in -8 territory but he continued to hold the presidency and there is no reason to think that the current occupant of the White House will stop destroying the economy and the democracy.
I hope you're right. Poll numbers aren't stopping Elon Musk and DOGE from slashing through the federal workforce and giving lucrative contracts to themselves and other trump donors, like the contract that just went to Workforce for managing government HR or the contract to Ramp for managing the federal payments system (not to mention, the SpaceX and Starlink contracts). Once these parasites are in our payment systems with no oversight it will be hard to shake them loose....
Also, public opinion polls will make it harder for Republicans to pass the worst version of Trump's Big, beautiful budget but they may not have to if all the illegal freezes of congressionally approved grant money and illegal firing of staff that disburses grants means that they can then use the fact that "these orgs didn't spent their grant money" to permanently lower their budgets in recission in September.
Public opinion also hasn't stopped the administration from closing the part of the DOJ that enforced voter suppression laws and the part of DHS that investigates foreign interference with voting machines. Or for firing the people in charge of looking for theft and corruption from each federal department and the military.
Finally, while public opinion is restraining Congress somewhat, Congress has only passed 5 bills since Trump took office, the only important one being the continuing resolution to keep finding the government. This admin is doing everything by executive order and ignoring court rulings not in their favor while firing or putting on administrative leave any federal employees who won't play along. And then pressuring the press, lawyers, judges, activists and academics who speak out.
I mean, of course it could be even worse
In 1935 FDR's approval numbers were underwater. Largely unnoticed today—by historians and the general public alike—Roosevelt was employing at the time the services of arguably the "inventor" of scientific, statistics-based public opinion such as we know it today (Emil Hurja; see the late Melvin Holli's "The Wizard of Washington") to help guide him with readings on public sentiment as he steered a perilous course through the turbulent waters of his first term. In June of that year, at a late-night dinner in the White House with the President, joined by Postmaster General Jim Farley, future Supreme Court justice Felix Frankfurter, then-head of the Securities and Exchange Commission Joseph Kennedy, and Secretary of Commerce Harry Hopkins, Hurja delivered a report on his recent polling of the public's sentiments regarding Roosevelt's manic drive to implement some of the more controversial elements of his New Deal agenda. Hurja basically told FDR, "Mr. President, you're messing up!" Forced to acknowledge a complicated truth he would rather have ignored, Roosevelt changed course dramatically in the coming weeks. Whereas, before that fateful meeting his approval numbers had been at an all-time historic low, FDR soon regained his momentum and secured a landslide victory in the 1936 presidential election. In this one instance, polling numbers played a pivotal role in helping save core elements of the New Deal—elements the current administration is doing its best (worst?) to dismantle. In short, opinion polls have their minuses, but, properly understood, they have their plusses too and ought not to be ignored.
Thanks for that bit of history I was unaware of.
Yes, polls matter! Thanks for sharing your insight! Happy weekend! Congrats on your Monday launch!
Sadly we are in a post-truth era, when facts have given way to feefees and the independent press has been overrun by "content creators" and "Influencers". Trump's supporters will seal clap and mouth breathe their approval no matter what he does, and the current circling down the drain that the USA is performing will turn into an outright flush into the sewer. I'm so sick of this.
We await proper forecast models--whenever it makes sense to run them.
I hope so, because frankly, the only thing stopping things from getting worse is hamstringing the GOP in congress.
What can I, we the people, do to help make sure we have fair elections?
Echo GEM - and also vote in EVERY election, be it local, state, whatever.
show up to town halls!