Here & Now

Wisconsin's Grumpy Electorate

Frederica Freyberg:

Results in the latest Marquette Law School poll suggest a grumpy electorate, according to its director. Charles Franklin points out that all seven of the politicians the survey asked about ranked more negative than positive. We check in now on the polling. Charles Franklin joins us from Madison. Nice to see you again.

Charles Franklin:

Thanks. Good to be here.

Frederica Freyberg:

You say this overriding negative mood is a first for your polling?

Charles Franklin:

Well, the extent of it. You know, this is our 67th Wisconsin statewide survey, and it’s the first time that all of the politicians we’ve asked about of both parties have had net negative favorability ratings. Now some of those are just barely net negative and some are pretty negative. So I don’t want to overstate it but it’s kind of interesting that we did 66 of these things and never had everybody in negative territory. And we do this time. That negativity is also seen in the right direction, wrong track number where 41% say we’re headed in the right direction, but 51% say off on the wrong track. It’s a shade better than two months ago, but it’s still pretty negative.

Frederica Freyberg:

So what is making the electorate so grumpy, in your words?

Charles Franklin:

I think it’s a variety of things. There’s certainly issues like inflation where 69% say they’re very concerned about inflation. That’s up from the 40s two months ago. So this is an issue to be taken seriously. Really the only positive numbers we’ve seen are some declining concern over COVID. I think that’s connected to the decline in cases that we’ve seen in the state and nationally over the last month or so. And then finally, when you ask people open-ended questions, feelings about government being broken and not working is not the top concern, but it usually makes the top five or six. So I think this combination of things coupled with, you know, not especially great economic news, not great virus news, all of that is part of the grumpiness.

Frederica Freyberg:

All right. Well, let’s spin through some of the telling results then. The poll from late October finds that when you asked whether they would vote to reelect Tony Evers or Ron Johnson, 53% of respondents said no to Evers and 52% said no to Johnson. As we were saying, it’s kind of equal partisan opportunity for these negative feelings but are these numbers a surprise to you at all?

Charles Franklin:

They are a little bit, and especially in this way. If I told you that a Democratic politician was at 40%, what would you think the Republican politician on the same survey would be? I think you would think they’d be at 60% because we’re so polarized. So to find both of them suffering equal opportunity grumpiness is I think a kind of telling thing. People within each of their parties are still strongly supportive of both Evers and of Johnson, and the opposite party is just bitterly negative, but it’s independents who are not happy with either of them and say they would vote for someone else. Let me hurry to say that we asked this question to get the baseline support of these folks. Someone else is always left to your imagination of how wonderful they can be.

Frederica Freyberg:

Right.

Charles Franklin:

By no means do I think either of these would get 40% of the vote in an election if we actually had one. But that 40% does set the baseline of the people that are pretty happy with both of these and the 52% or 53% says there’s an opportunity for a challenger to break through. We have 12 months for that challenger to emerge and actually accomplish that.

Frederica Freyberg:

Speaking of which, let’s take a look at our next slide that has to do with Joe Biden, his job approval. Biden’s job approval rating sits at 43%, 53% disapproval. What do you think the biggest factor is here and did it factor say in the Virginia governor’s race?

Charles Franklin:

Oh, I think it does factor in the Virginia race and in other political situations. The president does always influence midterm and off-year elections. Biden’s approval has fallen. It was at about 49% in August, a little bit positive in August. But, remember, August was the month of the Afghan withdrawal, which saw his numbers fall pretty sharply nationally. Also September with the surge in the virus, was an important time. And finally, we have the Congress which has as of this moment, has not passed either of the infrastructure or the reconciliation bills. So there’s also a sense that Washington’s not working even if it actually is working. It’s just really slow.

Frederica Freyberg:

Right. Well, let’s take a look at this next one. It seems like it’s a prize given all the oxygen being given to investigations and allegations in Wisconsin around the 2020 election. A full 65% of respondents say they have confidence in the 2020 election, with 32% saying that they don’t. What stands out in that kind of response for you?

Charles Franklin:

Here’s where the partisan split is just overwhelming. 64% of Republicans say they don’t have confidence, but 99% of Democrats say they do. Both of those line up with whether your party won or didn’t win the election pretty clearly. But among independents, which can be an important group in a closely-divided state like this, two-thirds, 67%, say they’re confident in the election outcome. Just 30% are not. And that I think is really an important political issue because it says this issue is burning within the Republican Party, but it’s really not burning with the general electorate. Interestingly, we found that two-thirds had not heard enough about the Gableman investigation to have an opinion looking into the election, but that “don’t know” rate was actually higher. 72% of Republicans had not heard of that investigation. So you have the people that are most concerned actually paying the least attention to the investigation that’s ongoing.

Frederica Freyberg:

That is actually a really stunning number, but maybe it is journalists and others that pay more attention to that than the people that are interested and spearheading it themselves. Charles, we need to leave it there. Thanks very much. We’ll see you for your next poll.

Charles Franklin:

Thank you. Take care.