The discontent among Republicans stems from their widespread, unfounded doubts about the legitimacy of the nation’s elections. For Democrats, it’s the realization that even though they control the White House and Congress, it’s Republicans, joined by their allies in fractured state legislatures and the Supreme Court, who are achieving much-coveted policy goals. For Republicans, distrust is a natural result of former President Donald J. Trump’s dominance of the party and, to a large extent, American politics. After seven years of relentlessly attacking the nation’s institutions, a broad majority of Republicans share his views on the 2020 election and its aftermath: 61% said he was the rightful winner, and 72% described Jan. 6 2021, Capitol attack as protest gets out of control. The results of the investigation come as the House committee that investigated on Jan. 6 revealed new evidence this week that Mr. Trump and his aides had a role in directing the mob on Capitol Hill to try to preserve his power in the executive branch. Among all voters, 49 percent said the Capitol uprising was an attempt to overthrow the government. Another 55 percent said Mr. Trump’s actions after the 2020 election had threatened American democracy. As with so many other issues, voters saw the rebellion through the same partisan lens as other issues. Seventy-six percent of Republican voters said Mr. Trump had merely exercised his right to challenge his loss to Joseph R. Biden Jr. Asked whether Mr. Trump had committed crimes while running for office, 89 percent of Democrats and 49 percent of independent voters said yes, while 80 percent of Republicans said no. “If I were Trump, I would be very angry about the whole situation,” said Charles Paris, 71, a retired firefighter from Evans, Ga. Among Democrats, 84 percent said the attack on Capitol Hill was an attempt to overthrow the government, and 92 percent said Mr. Trump threatened American democracy. Democrats’ pessimism about the future stems from their party’s inability to protect abortion rights, pass sweeping gun control measures and pursue other liberal priorities in the face of Republican opposition. Self-described liberals were more likely than other Democrats to have lost faith in government and more likely to say voting didn’t make a difference.
Key findings from the NY Times/Siena College poll
Card 1 of 8 The first poll of the midterms. The New York Times has released the first national survey for the 2022 midterms. Here’s what you need to know: Biden’s struggles with the Democrats. President Biden faces an alarming level of doubt from within his own party, with 64 percent of Democratic voters saying they would prefer a new flag bearer in 2024. Only 26 percent of Democrats said the party should reinstate him . A dark national mood. Voters nationally gave Mr. Biden a meager 33 percent job approval rating and only 13 percent said the nation was on the right track. But Mr. Biden maintained a narrow lead in a hypothetical 2024 rematch with Donald J. Trump: 44 percent to 41 percent. Some in the GOP are ready to leave Trump behind. As the former president weighs another run for the White House, nearly half of Republican primary voters would prefer someone other than Mr. Trump for president in 2024, with a significant number vowing to abandon him if he wins the nomination. Trump challenger emerging? In a hypothetical matchup with five GOP challengers, 49 percent of primary voters said they would support Mr. Trump. But Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, who was second with 25 percent, was the top choice among younger Republicans and those with a college degree. Tight race for Congress. Despite Mr. Biden’s low approval ratings, Democrats are nearly even with Republicans ahead of the midterm elections. Among registered voters, 41% said they prefer Democrats to control Congress compared to 40% who prefer Republicans. The class gap is widening. Voters who said abortion, guns or threats to democracy were the biggest problem facing the country supported Democrats by wide margins as Republicans make new inroads among nonwhite and working-class voters who still to worry more about the economy. Americans are frustrated with the government. Majorities of Americans across nearly every demographic and ideology believe the US government isn’t working, with 58 percent of voters saying the system needs major reforms or a complete overhaul. Americans’ bipartisan cynicism about government marks a striking philosophical shift: For generations, Democrats campaigned on the idea that government was a force for good, while Republicans sought to curtail it. Now, the poll shows, the number of Americans in both parties who believe their government is capable of responding to voters’ concerns has shrunk. In an indicator of how Americans’ perception of government has been transformed, the poll found that Fox News viewers were more optimistic than any other demographic about the country’s ability to get on the right track in the next decade: Seventy-two percent were optimistic about such a scenario. Ray Townley, 58, a retiree from Ozark, Ark., and a regular Fox News viewer, said he was very optimistic about the country’s future because he expected big changes in Washington. “They’re going to vote the Democrats out,” he said. More than half of voters surveyed, 53 percent, said the American political system was too divided to solve the nation’s problems, an increase from 40 percent in a Times/Siena poll from October 2020. The sentiment is now sharpest among black voters and younger voters. The lack of faith is most pronounced among the young, who have little or no memory of a time when American politics did not operate as a zero-sum affair. Almost half – 48 percent – of respondents aged 18 to 29 said the vote made no difference to how their government works. Mitch Toher, a 22-year-old independent from Austin, said there was no reason to vote because the country wouldn’t function as long as its government operated under the two-party system. Mr. Toher, who works in information technology, said he is not optimistic that the American political system or its elected officials are responsive enough to meet the needs of young voters. Voting either Democratic or Republican, he said, would do little to change things in his life for the better. “The biggest divide is not necessarily the left versus the right, but the generationally old versus the young,” he said. “I don’t think these kinds of changes will come anytime soon, or at least at this point in my life.” Rosantina Goforth, 55, of Wagoner, Okla., said officials at every level of government must be removed and replaced with people “who believe in the United States.” Ms. Goforth, who is retired from the military and said she got her news from Christian news programs, is one of the Republicans who falsely believe that Mr. Trump won the 2020 election. The vote, she said, has little importance in the way government operates. “Our sentence really doesn’t matter,” he said. “I know Trump won this election. It is a fact. He won this election. But somehow, you know, people were paid and votes were mishandled.” Some voters expressed frustration with a political system they felt was unable to deal with issues from across the ideological spectrum. Felix Gibbs, 66, a retired forklift operator from Niagara Falls, New York, said the government was unprepared to solve the two issues he saw as most pressing: illegal immigration and the lack of universal health coverage. “I’m sure there are other issues I can raise that will show that our political system is not working,” said Mr. Gibbs, who said he voted for Mr. Trump in 2020 and would do so again. The Supreme Court, which has long protected its reputation as above politics, is widely viewed as a political body, according to the poll. Nearly two-thirds of respondents said the justices’ decisions were based on their political views rather than the Constitution, a belief shared by 88% of Democrats and 39% of Republicans. Voters who backed Mr. Biden in 2020 said they were disappointed by the conservative majority on the Supreme Court, which includes three justices appointed by Mr. Trump. Elizabeth Thiel, 40, an administrative assistant from Lilburn, Ga., who was among the millions of suburban women who helped Mr. Biden win in 2020, said the country needed to end lifetime appointments for Supreme Court justices . Ms Thiel said the court’s recent rulings on gun control and abortion rights had undermined the country’s popular will. “We see it in the way they vote for and against things, and especially with Roe v. Wade a few weeks ago,” he said. “It’s just not right. I mean, it’s just not right.” Interviews with polled voters revealed rifts in American society that extended far beyond policy debates in Washington and extended to cultural issues that often dominate news coverage. Conservatives voiced their opposition to proposed gun control measures and gains for transgender people, while liberals said they could not believe the country’s civil rights progress had moved so slowly and that the Supreme Court had ended the federal right to abortion. Rachel Bernhardt, 62, a legal assistant from Silver Spring, Md., said her family had been involved in progressive politics since her grandfather served as an economist in the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration.
