Not that very long ago, Joe Biden’s job-approval rating seemed chronically and endlessly depressed; the Democratic-controlled Congress couldn’t get anything done; and all the indicators for the 2022 midterm elections looked terrible for the party, in part because its own voters were deeply disappointed with the lack of legislative productivity and a perceived absence of presidential leadership.
Now, in a series of legislative victories highlighted by the Schumer-Manchin budget-reconciliation agreement (now known as the Inflation Reduction Act, or IRA), Senate Democrats are suddenly walking tall, as Punchbowl News noted:
“Senate Democrats have put together an impressive resume this summer, most especially during the last two months. The CHIPS Plus Act, PACT Act, Sweden and Finland’s accession to NATO, gun control and reconciliation were all passed in this period, a number of them with big bipartisan majorities. All in a 50-50 Senate.”
Assuming the House finishes action on the IRA later this week, it’s quite the late-innings home run, complete with a rebranded title that shows Democrats at least trying to address what has been the dominant issue of the midterms: inflation. Along with the Kansas abortion-rights referendum on August 2 that shows that Democrats may have an issue of competing significance to both swing and base voters, the landscape is most definitely getting brighter for Democrats. And though Biden and his party probably had little to do with it, they will get credit for falling gasoline prices if they continue to drop.
In an interview with Politico, Biden’s pollster John Anzalone used a gambling analogy for the turnaround. “We put our last silver dollar in our slot machine and came up big,” he said. “And they were sitting there with a stack of chips and are down to just one. The turnaround is unbelievable.”
Spin aside, things are clearly looking better for Democrats, but the question (other than uncertainty over the future direction of crucial economic indicators) is whether midterm losses are already baked into the cake. After all, with the exception of George W. Bush in the immediate wake of 9/11, every president going back to the 1930s has lost ground in his first-term midterm election. Even very small House and Senate net losses would flip control to Republicans. And while a yearlong downward drift in Biden’s job-approval rating has now been replaced with small gains, it’s still dreadful at the moment: 39.6 percent in the averages at both FiveThirtyEight and RealClearPolitics. At this point in 2018, Donald Trump’s RCP job-approval average was 43.4 percent, and his party was on the way to losing 41 House seats. Then, too, the “direction of the country” right-track, wrong-track ratio was 41-51. Now it’s 20-73.
Sure, Democratic base voters unhappy with earlier legislative misfires may now have a sunnier outlook on the party’s congressional candidates. That, along with the growing anger at conservative Supreme Court justices and anti-abortion Republican state officials, could certainly improve Democratic turnout. But Republicans will likely retain an advantage of core swing-voter concerns that are unlikely to go away by November 8, as Senator Marco Rubio suggested in a taunting floor speech on the IRA over the weekend:
“There isn’t a single thing in this bill that helps working people lower the prices of groceries, or the price of gasoline, or the price of housing, or the price of clothing. There isn’t a single thing in this bill that’s gonna keep criminals in jail. There isn’t a single thing in this bill that’s going to secure our border. Those happen to be things that working people in this country care about.”
That too is spin, of course, but the point is that GOP talking points really don’t have to change in light of the IRA’s passage.
The best empirical news for Democrats is the trajectory of the congressional generic ballot, the midterm indicator that has had the most predictive value in the past. As recently as June 13, Republicans had a 3.5 percent advantage in the RCP averages for this measurement of congressional voting preferences, with the expectation that the margin would widen as voting grew near. Now the generic ballot is basically tied (Republicans: 44.7 percent, Democrats: 44.6 percent). Historically, the party controlling the White House loses steam late in the midterm cycle, but at the moment, Biden’s party does seem to have some momentum. And in the national contest where Democrats have most reason to be optimistic, the battle for control of the Senate, Republicans continue to suffer from candidate-quality problems that could lose them seats they probably should win in a midterm. John Fetterman keeps maintaining a solid lead over Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania; this race is for a seat currently held by the GOP. And in Georgia, Raphael Warnock continues to run comfortably ahead of Herschel Walker even before the frequently tongue-tied former football great reluctantly faces the highly eloquent incumbent Democrat in debates.
There is no way to know, much less factor in, late-breaking real-world developments that might affect the trajectory of these and other midterm contests, whether it’s unexpected economic news, a change of direction in the Russia-Ukraine war, or an official 2024 candidacy announcement by Trump that reminds Democrats that the wolf is still at the door. Typically, voting preferences form well before Election Day, and early voting will begin in September in some states. At present, FiveThirtyEight gives Republicans an 80 percent probability of controlling the House next year and Democrats a 59 percent chance of holding the Senate. These numbers are better for Democrats than those we saw in June and July, and that’s grounds for gratitude.
In general, it’s folly to compare Bush’s approval number from poll A this week with his number from poll B last week; it has to be apples and apples, or else you’re mostly looking at differences in systematic error. And even in an apples-to-apples comparison, you’re likely to spend a lot of time looking at random sampling error, unless you look at long-term trends and discount one- or two-point blips from week to week. Every time a poll comes out you see people writing elaborate post-hoc analyses of what the last week’s movements mean. This is all garbage, like those articles in the financial section in which somehow people can always justify why the previous day’s movements in the stock market made logical sense, even though they usually can’t predict them in advance.
Fox News had Bush’s approval rating at 50%, so that means it’s really about 45%, which most other pollsters are reporting. Of course, it has gone up a little since the attack ads on Kerry, but since that affect also eliminated Kerry’s lead, Kerry is now back in the lead (“It’s Official, Kerry’s Ahead”).
Steve, Don’t worry about Bush’s approval rating in that Annenberg poll. If you look at http://www.pollingreport.com, the Annenberg approval numbers are always about 5 points higher than everyone else. 53 percent is actually a new low for Bush in that poll.
“The fact that Bush is so down and people have already given Kerry competitive general ratings against Kerry gives Kerry (not Bush) a lot of upside here.”
Oops. I meant to say “The fact that Bush is so down and people have already given Kerry competitive general ratings against Bush gives Kerry (not Bush) a lot of upside here.”
Sorry for the slip.
Actually, I _have_ seen some numbers where Kerry’s approval on terrorism have come up slightly (I can’t remember where just off the top of my head, though).
But I’m not too suprised or worried Bush’s approval numbers aren’t worse. They’re certainly not rising substantially.
I’ve posted a variation on this theme here before, but it bears repeating: almost by definition by the fact we read this Web site and take the time to respond means we are totally “plugged in” on this election already. We are the minority at this point.
For most Americans, the election is this hazy thing still seven months off. They aren’t paying the same attention we are. Kerry acknowledged the other day most people don’t really know him. That will change as Election Day approaches.
The fact that Bush is so down and people have already given Kerry competitive general ratings against Kerry gives Kerry (not Bush) a lot of upside here.
My bottom line: be patient. If we are still in this position after the conventions, *then* start to panic.
just a reminder:
“Beyond the Euphrates began for us the land of mirage and danger, the sands where one helplessly sank, and the roads which ended in nothing. The slightest reversal would have resulted in a jolt to our prestige giving rise to all kinds of catastrophe; the problem was not only to conquer but to conquer again and again, perpetually; our forces would be drained off in the attempt.”
Emperor Hadrian AD 117-138
It’s true that by himself, Bush’s approval ratings on specific war & terrorism issues is dropping. But when compared to Kerry (i.e. the question, “Who would do a better job defending the U.S. against terrorism” and the like), Bush still maintains a very comfortable lead. At least according to the last numbers I saw on tarrance.com. When asked about Bush’s performance by itself, it may be only a 51% approval of his actions regarding Iraq, but head to head against Kerry, they’re much higher.
Why is this? People think Bush is bad, but Kerry is worse? People figure Bush has been at it long enough, he’s bound to figure it out eventually? People know what they’re getting with Bush, but Kerry is an unknown? I’d be curious about the reasons. It would seem to me that if you’re not satisfied with the way Bush is handling things, you’d want to hand the job over to someone else, but people seem to be indicating the opposite.
Other question worth asking is whether the spread between Bush and Kerry on Iraq & terrorism issues is shrinking any in recent weeks / months.
If Bush’s speech/press conference doesn’t result in a drop in the polls for him, much less a bounce, we’re all screwed.
I mean if that pathetic performance makes his numbers go up, what kind of performance makes them go down?
uh…but he’s strong leader….
buhlahbuhlahbuhlah.
I doubt that “conference” will create any sort of rally. Here’s a great dissection of it:
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/041504A.shtml
DonkeyRising says “By about 2:1 (57-29), the public says the Iraq war has increased the risk of terrorism against the US. Wow.”
The scary thing is that the same Annenberg poll shows Bush with an approval rating of 53%–and increasing! That’s “Wow”. Does this mean that the majority of Americans like Bush so much, it doesn’t matter what he does?
As a resident of Minnesota I really wish the LA Times let me read the article.
Oh well, Bush sucks and sentiment here in MN is starting to reflect that. We’ll deliver these 10 electoral votes to Kerry, fear not.