31 October 2019 — 0759 mdt
A state level map of support for impeaching Trump
Watergate documents website. All the President’s men, Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward. Read the book, watch the movie. The Final Days, Bernstein and Woodward. The Bretheren, Woodward and Scott Armstrong. Includes insights into the Supreme Court’s deliberations on the Watergate tapes. The Federal Impeachment Process, Michael Gerhardt. Available for Kindle for just $5.39.
At some point today, the U.S. House of Representatives is expected to vote on House Resolution 660, which affirms that an impeachment inquiry is underway and lays out the rules for conducting that inquiry.
Update. The resolution was approved on an almost pure partyline vote.
On a national level, a narrow majority supports impeachment. I looked at polling results from Civiqs, an online operation, and FiveThirtyEight, which aggregates and averages polls.
Civiqs asked “Would you support or oppose impeaching Donald Trump?” The result: 52 percent support; 45 percent oppose; three percent were unsure.
More states, comprising more people, support than oppose impeachment.
As displayed on the map below, the level of support for impeaching Trump varies from state-to-state, and is pretty much the inverse of a state’s approval/disapproval of Trump’s job performance.
At FiveThirtyEight, three sets of impeachment poll averages are available: polls measuring support for an impeachment inquiry, polls measuring support for impeaching Trump, and all polls. The results:
Wisconsin
The Badger State produced “Fighting Bob” LaFollette, "Tail Gunner Joe" McCarthy, William Proxmire, Russell Feingold, William Walker, and some of the smelliest cheeses known to humankind. It's a swing state that Trump carried in 2016 by a 21,748 vote plurality, 47.22 percent to Hillary Clinton's 46.45 percent.
Although on 15 October Civiqs found in Wisconsin a net support for impeachment of five percent (51 percent in support, 46 opposed, and three percent unsure), a Marquette Law School poll of 729 registered voters conducted from 13 to 17 October found a minus three percent net support for impeachment. Marquette’s sampling margin of error is approximately 3.6 percent, Civiqs’ three percent.
Both Marquette and Civiqs found that Trump’s net job approval rating in Wisconsin was underwater. For Civiqs, Trump’s net approval was minus four percent (47 percent approved, 51 poercent disapproved, two percent were unsure). Marquette put his net approval at minus five percent.
As both Civiqs and Marquette report Trump’s job approval rating is underwater in Wisconsin, it’s fair to ask whether Marquette’s numbers on impeachment are outliers.
Public opinion on impeachment may stay steady for a while
During the Watergate affair, which stretched out almost two years from the time the burglary at the DNC was discovered in 1972 until Nixon resigned in 1974, Republic support for Nixon stayed strong until the very end, when the White House tapes finally were released and proved to be the smoking gun bearing Nixon’s fingerprints. Then his support collapsed. Sens. Hugh Scott and Barry Goldwater, and Rep. John Rhodes, visited the White House, telling Nixon face to face that should the Senate hold an impeachment trial, he would be convicted and removed from office. We’re a long way from that point with Trump.
Support for impeachment is not likely to increase significantly until all the evidence has been laid out in widely televised and watched public hearings. Thus far, I think there’s a strong case that Trump attempted to use money appropriated by Congress to strongarm the leader of a foreign country into digging up dirt on Joe Biden. That’s not business as usual, although Trump, who comes from the cutthroat world of bullyboy real estate development, may think so. I don’t consider it treason, but I do think its dangerous political corruption, an impeachable high crime.
Were Trump to be impeached today, the votes to convict him do not exist. That could change, however, if public opinion begins turning against him. When support for impeachment reaches 65–70 percent, his firewall in the Senate will begin shrinking, perhaps becoming too small to keep him from being kicked out the White House, off Air Force One, and back to Trump Towers and that run down golf club in owns in Florida.