In The News

In The News | November 25, 2019

FARRELL: Public Opinion Isn’t Moving On Impeachment, And Democrats Are Running Out Of Time

From Chris Farrell’s Op-Ed for The Daily Caller:

The impeachment drama on Capitol Hill generates screaming headlines portending the imminent end of the Trump presidency. But public opinion is not heading where the Democrats are trying to lead it.

Take, for example, the MSN Daily Presidential Tracking Poll. Since late August, when this issue began to blow up, the president’s approval rating has fluctuated between 42 and 46 percent, showing no distinct trend. Granted, there is good reason to argue about the polling methodology and whether this number undercounts Trump’s support. Major polling organizations have shown no signs of having learned any lessons from their disastrous showing in 2016.

The important factor here is the trendline, which is basically flat. Neither approval or disapproval are moving in any solid direction, which is to say the impeachment spectacle is not changing anyone’s mind. The same is true for the question of whether the Senate should remove the president if the House impeaches. MSN claims that number is at 52 percent, but it was at 55 percent on Oct. 4, so it’s not exactly a groundswell for removal.

Likewise look at the aggregate data from the FiveThirtyEight site. Support for impeachment was mired in the mid-thirties throughout the Mueller/Russia imbroglio, and only jumped to the low 50s in September when the Democrats began making impeachment part of their vocabulary with respect to Ukraine. But after the initial surge in interest, the numbers flatlined, suggesting this movement had more to do with anti-Trumpers being given party-line permission to talk about impeachment more than any facts that have been put in evidence.

Likewise look at the FiveThirtyEight aggregate Trump approval rankings. Trump’s lowest approval during his presidency was in December 2017, when he was supposedly in the in the mid-30s. Now his numbers are almost ten points higher by their reckoning. And Trump is not even at their supposed low for the year, which occurred last January. Again, you can judge FiveThirtyEight’s results against their abysmal 2016 performance, but the trendlines are the key, and they don’t show the public rallying against the president.

The press is naturally doing its part to push the narrative. Take Thursday’s Washington Post print edition headline, “Diplomat acknowledges ‘quid pro quo,’” referring to Ambassador Gordon Sondland’s testimony. Those of us who follow the story know Sondland only acknowledged his personal presumption of a quid pro quo, produced no evidence that it actually existed, and admitted later when questioned by Republicans that the president specifically stated that he wanted nothing from Ukraine and there was no “quid pro quo.” The irony value of The Post’s “Democracy dies in darkness” motto grows day by day.