In September, as the deadline for a government shutdown approached, polls suggested most Americans were poised to blame Republicans for the problem. In early October, as the shutdown got underway, a variety of national surveys — from The Washington Post, New York Times/Siena, Morning Consult, Marist/PBS News/NPR et al. — found that Americans were, in fact, holding Republicans responsible for the developments.
As October comes to an end and leading GOP voices scramble to blame Democrats for the standoff, there’s fresh evidence that those efforts aren’t working, either. The Washington Post reported:
More Americans blame President Donald Trump and Republicans in Congress than Democrats for the nearly month-long government shutdown, according to a Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll. More than 4 in 10 U.S. adults — 45 percent — say Trump and the GOP are mainly responsible for the shutdown that may lead the government to cut off anti-hunger benefits, has caused air traffic delays and has furloughed hundreds of thousands of federal workers.
The overall totals have barely budged since the same pollster asked the same question a month ago. On Oct. 1, 47% of the public blamed Trump and GOP lawmakers, while 30% held Democrats responsible. A month later, 45% blamed Republicans, while 33% pointed the finger at Democrats.
That’s a slight shift in the GOP’s favor, but it’s within the poll’s margin of error, and the overall results offer little good news for the White House and its allies.
As we’ve discussed, the politics of this latest shutdown are a bit tricky, and these results were hardly inevitable. On the surface, it’s Democrats who are demanding concessions, which might suggest they’re more likely to be held responsible.
But relevant details complicate matters. The concessions Democrats are demanding are popular — they’re fighting to make health care benefits more affordable for American families — and they’re going up against a Republican Party that controls the House, the Senate and the White House.
What’s more, it’s GOP officials who’ve spent the last three decades shutting down the government (or threatening to do so on a very regular basis), and they’ve created a political brand that’s widely recognized by much of the public.
Public attitudes can change, and people can be persuaded to adopt different positions. But Republican officials spent the entire month of October trying to deflect blame and turn the tables, and the latest public opinion research suggests they’ve failed. This is more than just a curiosity: As policymakers face new pressures to end the crisis, polling suggests Republicans are not in a position of political strength. Three days into the shutdown, The Associated Press reported that GOP leaders were confident they held “the upper hand” in this standoff. They were wrong then, and they’re still wrong now. This post updates our related earlier coverage.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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