This week, I gave the polling presentation for Civitas, the conservative advocacy organization. The poll should be a stark warning for Republicans. It’s not time for them to hit the panic button yet, but if the trends continue, they’re in deep trouble.
The most shocking number is the generic ballot question for legislative races. The poll asks, “If the election for state legislature in your area were held today, would you be voting for the Democrat, the Republican, neither or don’t know.” By a margin of 47% to 32%, respondents said they would choose the Democrat. That’s a fifteen point spread. To put those numbers into perspective, that’s the largest spread the poll has ever recorded. The last time it was even close to as wide was October 2010, when Republicans held a seven-point advantage just ahead of their wave election that gave them control of both chambers of the legislature. This poll could be an outlier but if this is the beginning of a trend, the GOP should be running for cover.
It’s hard to say definitively what’s causing the collapse in support, but a few notable trends seem to be good suspects. Donald Trump is underwater. Fifty-three percent of respondents view the president unfavorably, only 42% have a favorable opinion of him. Unless things change dramatically, Trump will dominate the news cycle, probably to the detriment of his fellow Republicans.
The other problem hanging over the GOP is their health care reform bill. Only 27% of voters think it will be better than Obamacare while 43% think if will make health care worse. And this poll was conducted before the CBO scoring came out this week indicating that the bill would strip health insurance away from 23 million Americans, including people with pre-existing conditions.
Voters may be feeling duped by the GOP. Donald Trump promised to repeal Obamacare on “day one” on his presidency and replace it with a program that would insure more people, provide better coverage, and lower premiums. It was a promise he and the Republicans can’t keep. Voters maybe having buyer’s remorse.
In other numbers, Governor Roy Cooper is still enjoying a honeymoon. Sixty-one percent of respondents approve of the job he’s doing while only 24% disapprove. Also, in a question that asks, “If you had to choose, which of the following do you think cares the MOST about you and people like you?” almost twice as many people chose Cooper than the state legislature. At some point, those numbers will probably shrink, but for the time being, Cooper’s still got a lot of political capital while the GOP legislators have very little.
This poll may be an outlier. Any polling organization that regularly tests voters gets a lousy sample every now and then. But if other polls show similar trends or the Civitas poll next month has numbers like these, Republicans should start to make serious adjustments.
Thomas Mills is the founder and publisher of PoliticsNC.com. Before beginning PoliticsNC, Thomas spent twenty years as a political and public affairs consultant. Learn more >
Democrats will need a statistical advantage going into 2018 to overcome the structural advantage the Republicans have built creating gerrymandered districts which thwart the popular vote. The legislators have deployed effective, powerful computer technology and voter data to carefully select who they will allow to cast votes in their districts. If you are planning to vote for a Democrat, you could be pushed into a Democratic district or your vote will be watered down by an overwhelming number of Republican votes. If gerrymandering does not do enough, voter suppression will scorch the rest of the earth so that Republicans are the only candidates standing. To be competitive, Democrats need about 6%-10% more votes than Republican rivals in competitive districts. The minority controls the rest of us.
One harsh reality is that too many people consume false narratives generated by the right wing and Russian operatives. A North Carolinian drove to Washington DC recently, armed and ready for combat. He entered a pizza parlor in Georgetown for the purpose of breaking up a child prostitution operation, somehow connected to Hillary Clinton, purportedly operating out of the basement. He learned, upon entering the establishment, that the building had no basement. They served only pizza, and the owners were not aware that Infowars and a variety of fake news sites were reporting the human trafficking. . The North Carolinian was arrested, but he certainly was not the only person who believed the preposterous story. Even the most bizarre messaging carries some impact on the right.
How do Democrats reach these voters? What impact does the alternative universe have on our politics? I would have guessed that the impact of mind-boggling stupidity and fact-free insanity to be minimal, but here we are. We have an apparently larger-than-expected gun-loving, undereducated minority so gullible and so impressionable that they swallow the fantastical, improbable lunacy spouted by Russian spies and American traitors with great gusto. How do we measure that? They matter; they vote, but they don’t have the ability read and understand basic concepts of political reality.
There is much work to do for Democrats, but we need a different approach. Insanity is in the saddle and it is riding us.
Really great comment, Jay. Agreed on all points.
As a candidate for the State Senate in District 48, I find it heartening to know that there is a glimmer of hope in this very red district. Our are the issues that reflect the needs of the working people of North Carolina. Hopefully, we can help the voters to realize that and show up to change North Carolina for the better.
As a candidate for US House of Representatives in NC District 11, I too find it heartening to know of this glimmer of hope. I feel, however, that the glimmer is more like a brush fire that is growing quickly. We must keep putting fuel on this fire and let the hard working people of Western North Carolina know that we are standing for them and that their interests are our concerns.
Let’s not put too much stock in polls, especially early on. Have we already forgotten what happened in the Rust Belt, with polls and Time magazine showing Hillary to be Madam President? We later found out that many Trump voters were keeping their positions to themselves. It is likely to happen again in 2018 in US Congressional races, to wit, “Oh, I will say definitely that I am not voting for the Republican candidate, but when I step into the booth, guess which lever I am going to pull.”
Sure, Thomas Hill.
So, why bother planning any campaigns until next summer?
There will be plenty of time to start in July, 2018, right?
Here’s what I have learned as a political consultant for the past 50 years:
Now is the time to recruit candidates, raise money, prepare campaign plans, build organizations, train candidates (NCIOPL), collect lists, sign up volunteers and fund raisers….(I am already exhausted just thinking about it).
If I were you, I would stop asserting that the polls were wrong in 2016. They measured the national popular vote right on the money. If we didn’t have such a screwed up system with the Electoral College, the polls would have been right again as they are most of the time.
And, today, if you look at trend lines in North Carolina and around the country, the polls will over time show you where we are headed.
End of Introduction to Polling 101 and end of my homily.. Peace.
Walt,
There is a nagging issue called reality. We often hear what we want to hear and go charging away, as we recruit new candidates every two years. I am not criticizing being well-prepared or starting early. But as we look back at races involving Republicans like Patrick McHenry and Virginia Foxx, we see a trail of good Democratic candidates who put everything they has into the races but never had any chance. Today’s candidates should be aware that their predecessors were no less motivated or enthusiastic than they are. I think that I will skip the last eight years of your 101 class. Were you surprised to learn that the US President is elected by the Electoral College?
BTW, there is a cottage industry of people like yourself who recruit others to run for office and are paid for working in their campaigns. But the rubber hits the road when they themselves become candidates. I salute Thomas Mills for having the courage to cross that line.
WALT is right on the money with his advice. Anyone running against an incumbent starts with a disadvantage and has to start early in order to build the organization needed to raise name recognition and, lord help us, money.
Don’t be so cautious, Thomas. Civitas polling, I have found, is usually pretty accurate even though they are a conservative, Republican leaning group. But their findings on the generic ballot legislative question are startling.
I don’t know what PPP is finding on the generic legislative ballot question in North Carolina but national polls are also finding a significant Democratic advantage in the 2018 races for U.S. Congress.
I suspect that what is happening is a reaction to Trump, GOP health care, and general dissatisfaction with government and politics.
Let me strongly suggest that your readers who may be thinking this is the time to run for the NC State Legislature—Jump in! Apply now for the Fall, 2017 Fellows Class of the North Carolina Institute of Political Leadership. Go on line and do so now. The 2018 and 2020 elections are looking more and more look to be transformative both in the primaries and general elections.