Another new poll finds that a majority of Americans say that they support the impeachment and removed of President Trump, a remarkable shift in public opinion over the course of just about one month:
Half of Americans say President Donald Trump should be impeached and removed from office, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS, a new high in CNN polling on the topic and the first time that support for impeachment and removal has significantly outpaced opposition.
As support for impeachment has inched upward, however, Trump’s approval ratings overall and for handling major issues have not taken a hit. Overall, 41% approve of his handling of the presidency and 57% disapprove, similar to his ratings in early September and August polls conducted before the House of Representatives formally launched an impeachment inquiry in late September.
The share who say Trump used his office improperly to gain political advantage against a potential 2020 opponent in his interactions with the President of Ukraine stands at 49%, about the same as in the September CNN poll. At the same time, more now say Trump did not use the presidency improperly (43%, up from 39%), as the share who are undecided on the question dipped. That shift was largely driven by a 16-point increase in the share of Republicans who say Trump didn’t improperly use the presidency (from 71% to 87%).
Overall, 50% say the things that Trump has said publicly about his handling of US relations with Ukraine are mostly false. Fewer, 44%, think the President is mostly telling the truth about it, with views sharply divided by party (86% of Republicans say his public statements on it have been mostly true, while 83% of Democrats say mostly false).
Support for impeachment and removal is strongest among Democrats (87% favor it) and stands at 50% among independents. Among Republicans, just 6% say they support impeaching and removing the Republican President, lower than the 14% who said so in a September CNN poll. While a handful of other polls also have found support for impeachment in double digits among Republicans, most have found Republican support closer to the level in the new CNN poll than the September one.
Beyond partisanship, demographic dividing lines on impeachment seem to mirror those that have driven Trump’s approval rating throughout his presidency. Women (56%) are more apt than men (44%) to favor impeachment and removal. Nonwhites (68%) support it in greater numbers than whites (40%), and whites are split by education (51% with college degrees back impeachment and removal vs. 35% of those without degrees) and further by gender (26% of white men without college degrees favor impeachment and removal, but that more than doubles to 54% among white women who hold four-year degrees).
The poll finds that Americans overall are entrenched in their views on each side of the impeachment debate. Among those who say Trump should be impeached and removed, 90% say they feel that way strongly, as do 86% of those who say he should not be impeached and removed.
This follows on a poll last week from Gallup that found similar numbers, as well as a Pew Research Center poll, This is just the latest change in what has beccome a dramatic shift in public opinion on the impeachment issue.
For the better part of the year, as we’ve awaited the conclusion of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian election interference and potential collusion and thereafter, the American public had largely opposed the impeachment of the President or even opening an impeachment investigation. With the exception of self-identified Democrats, most Americans apparently did not believe that there was sufficient evidence to support taking such an extraordinary Constitutional step.
For the better part of the year, as we’ve awaited the conclusion of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian election interference and potential collusion and thereafter, the American public had largely opposed the impeachment of the President or even opening an impeachment investigation. With the exception of self-identified Democrats, most Americans apparently did not believe that there was sufficient evidence to support taking such an extraordinary Constitutional step.
That began to change after the news broke regarding the President’s efforts to enlist the assistance of the President of Ukraine to uncover damaging information about a potential political rival and the events that have occurred since then that have only made the President look worse. By the end of September, a number of polls that had previously shown public opposition to impeachment began to show that at least a plurality of respondents supported opening an impeachment inquiry. At the beginning of October, a new Washington Post/Schar School poll shows for the first time that a majority of Americans support not just impeachment but, if the evidence supports it, removal of the President from office
That began to change after the news broke regarding the President’s efforts to enlist the assistance of the President of Ukraine to uncover damaging information about a potential political rival and the events that have occurred since then that have only made the President look worse. As I noted a week ago, a number of polls that had previously shown public opposition to impeachment began to show that at least a plurality of respondents supported opening an impeachment inquiry. Earlier this month, a Washington Post/Schar School poll showed for the first time that a majority of Americans support not just impeachment but, if the evidence supports it, removal of the President from office.
As Philip Bump notes at The Washington Post, the fact that we’ve reached this milestone this quickly is significant in no small part because we didn’t see numbers like this for President Nixon until shortly before he was forced to resign in the wake of an inevitable impeachment and trial that would result in his removal from office.
All of this is significant for several reasons. First of all, of course, is the simple fact that we are at or near the point where a majority of Americans support at least an impeachment inquiry directed at the President of the United States. This is significant because we didn’t reach this point with Nixon until well into the Watergate investigation and that Nixon continued to enjoy high levels of support right up until the Supreme Court ordered the Oval Office tapes released and the public heard for themselves what the President said behind the scenes. At that point, there could be no denying his guilt.
This time, the shift has occurred over a short period of time, and we’ve reached the point where a majority of Americans are willing to contemplate impeachment and a plurality are willing to contemplate removal from office. his shift has occurred over a short amount of time, which is notable in and of itself. The best explanation for this, I suppose is the fact that the current story about Trump’s pressure on the Ukrainian investigation is far easier to understand than the Russia investigation and appears on the surface to be far more serious than the Emoluments Clause and porn star payoff stories. Indeed, as I’ve noted before, the main documents in this case — the transcript of the Trump-Zelensky phone call, the whistleblower’s complaint, and the Inspector General’s report, — amount to just about 21 pages and are fairly easy to read notwithstanding the fact that there still seem to be Republicans in Congress who have not gotten around to it. Additionally, notwithstanding the efforts of the Administration and its supporters to argue otherwise, the evidence is blindingly clear hear.
Given the fact that Republicans are remaining loyal to the President in huge numbers, it’s not likely we’ll see these numbers jump much higher unless and until Republicans start putting their country first and their party second.
