As Election Day approaches, many political observers have become addicted to the RealClearPolitics average of polls. Whenever someone brings up a hotly contested race, invariably the next question is, “What’s the RCP average?” However, accurate polling has become challenging for surveyers because of the current toxic political environment. Liberty Nation and others have reported that the crosstabs in several polls reveal many pro-Trump voters have refused to participate. Other indicators are just as valid, if not more so, than averaging out polls that may not reflect the electorate. The Gallup organization recently updated an election analysis they have been tracking since 1945. And if the past is prologue, Republicans are poised for historic midterms.
Historic Midterms in the Making
Just a few weeks before Joe Biden took office, a Gallup survey showed that only 10% of Americans considered the economy the most vexing problem facing the nation. Fast-forward to September 2022, and that number jumped to 38%. Gallup dug deeper into the issue and asked respondents, “Which political party do you think can do a better job of handling the problem you think is most important -- the Republican Party or the Democratic Party?” Forty-eight percent of Americans said the GOP, and 37% replied the Democrats. This separation of 11% is a remarkable number, and only one time since Gallup began asking this series of questions to Americans in 1945 was a more significant divide reported. That was in 1946, when the GOP posted a 17% lead over Democrats.
Guess what happened in the 1946 midterms? Republicans picked up 55 House seats. While the “most important issue” indicator isn’t perfect, it has had a solid track record over the last 77 years.
The Abortion Factor
When the US Supreme Court issued a landmark decision earlier this year overturning Roe v. Wade, Democrats did everything they could to rally their base. For a time, 8% of those polled by Gallup said it was their most critical concern. However, the Dems could not sustain that gain. As of September, the topic of abortion rights was ranked as the most important issue by a modest 4% of Americans.
(Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
Worse still for the party of the progressives are the non-economic issues that rate high on the list of voter anxieties. Poor leadership polled the highest at 22%. This is an indictment of the ruling party – in this case, the Democrats. Next on the list is immigration at 6% and crime/violence at 4% – two worries where the public often turns to the GOP.
What about all the blathering regarding gun control? Despite the media hype, it scored a paltry 1%. Other issues most often identified with the Dems, like welfare, Social Security, and Medicare, had negligible results – meaning they didn’t even make it up to the 1% level of concern.
The moral of the story is that if Americans vote on what matters most, then the GOP has quite an edge in the House – potentially one of historic proportions. This should spill over to the Senate, but that’s a more complex call to make, in which case you are welcome to consult RealClearPolitics. They have Republicans picking up two seats – one in Nevada and the other in Georgia. It is worth mentioning that the RCP projection of a win in the Peach State goes against their own average.
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