Majorities of American voters across nearly all demographics and ideologies believe their system of government isn’t working, with 58 percent of respondents to a New York Times/Siena College poll saying the world’s oldest independent constitutional democracy needs major reforms or complete change.
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, Republicans, along with their allies in the manipulated state legislatures and Supreme Court, are the ones achieving long-sought policy goals.
For Republicans, distrust is a natural result of the dominance of former President Donald J. Trump in the party and largely in American politics. After seven years of relentlessly attacking the country’s institutions, a large majority of Republicans share his view of the 2020 election and its aftermath: 61 percent said he was the legitimate winner, and 72 percent described what happened on Jan. 6 2021 attack on the Capitol as a protest that got out of hand.
The survey results come after a House committee investigating Jan. 6 revealed new evidence this week that Mr. Trump and his aides had a hand in directing the crowd to the Capitol to try to maintain his hold on executive power.
Among all voters, 49 percent said the Capitol riot was an attempt to overthrow the government. Another 55 percent say Mr. Trump’s actions since the 2020 election have threatened American democracy. As with so many other issues, voters saw the riot through the same partisan lens as other issues.
Seventy-six percent of Republican voters said Mr. Trump was simply exercising 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 he had not.
“If I were Trump, I would be very angry about the whole situation,” said Charles Parrish, 71, a retired firefighter from Evans, Georgia.
Among Democrats, 84 percent said the Capitol attack was an attempt to topple 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-identified liberals are more likely than other Democrats to have lost confidence in government and are more likely to say voting doesn’t matter.
Key findings from the NY Times/Siena College poll
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The first survey of the mid-term cycle. The New York Times has released its first national survey of the 2022 midterm cycle. Here’s what you need to know:
Biden’s struggles with 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 standard-bearer in 2024. Only 26 percent of Democrats said the party should nominate him again.
Gloomy national mood. Voters nationwide gave Mr. Biden a modest 33 percent job approval and just 13 percent said the nation was on the right track. Still, 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 abandon Trump. As the former president weighs another bid 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 pledging to abandon him if he wins the nomination.
Trump challenger emerging? In a hypothetical matchup against 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 of younger Republicans and those with college degrees.
Tight race for Congress. Despite Mr. Biden’s low approval ratings, Democrats are roughly tied with Republicans ahead of the midterm elections. Among registered voters, 41 percent say they prefer Democrats to control Congress, compared to 40 percent who prefer Republicans.
The class divide widens. Voters who said abortion, guns or threats to democracy were the biggest issue facing the country backed Democrats by a wide margin as Republicans made new inroads among non-white and working-class voters who remain more concerned about the economy.
Americans are frustrated with government. Majorities of Americans across nearly all demographics and ideologies believe the U.S. government isn’t working, with 58 percent of voters saying the system needs major reforms or an overhaul.
Americans’ bipartisan cynicism about government signals a striking philosophical shift: For generations, Democrats campaigned on the idea that government is a force for good, while Republicans sought to limit it. Now, according to the survey, the number of Americans in both parties who believe their government is able to address voters’ concerns has declined.
As one indicator of how Americans’ perception of government has transformed, the survey found that Fox News viewers are more optimistic than any other demographic about the country’s ability to get on the right track in the next decade: seventy-two percent hope for such a scenario.
Ray Townley, 58, a retiree from Ozark, Arkansas, and a regular Fox News viewer, said he is very optimistic about the country’s future because he expects big changes in Washington.
“They’re going to vote the Democrats out,” he said.
More than half of voters polled, 53 percent, say America’s political system is too divided to solve the nation’s problems, up from 40 percent in an October 2020 Times/Siena poll. Sentiment now most acute among blacks voters and the youngest voters.
The lack of faith is most stark among the young, who have little or no memory of a time when American politics did not operate as a zero-sum affair. Nearly half – 48 percent – of 18- to 29-year-olds said the vote had not changed the way their government operates.
Mitch Toher, a 22-year-old independent from Austin, said there’s little reason to vote because the country won’t function as long as its government operates under a 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 Democrat or Republican, he said, would not change things in his life for the better.
“The biggest divide is not necessarily left versus right, but those who are generationally old versus young,” he said. “I don’t think that kind of change is coming anytime soon, or at least I don’t think it’s coming in my lifetime.”
Rosantina Goforth, 55, of Wagoner, Oklahoma, said officials at every level of government should 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 mistakenly believed Mr. Trump had won the 2020 election. The vote, she said, would not great importance to how government works.
“Our opinion really doesn’t matter,” she said. “I know Trump won this election. That’s a given. He won that election. But one way or another, you know, people got paid and votes were mismanaged.”
Some voters expressed frustration with a political system they saw as ill-equipped to deal with issues across the ideological spectrum. Felix Gibbs, 66, a retired forklift operator from Niagara Falls, N.Y., said the government is ill-equipped to address the two problems he sees as most pressing: illegal immigration and the lack of universal health insurance.
“I’m sure there are other issues that 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 it again
The Supreme Court, which has long maintained a reputation for being above politics, is widely perceived as a political body, the survey found. Nearly two-thirds of those surveyed said the justices’ decisions were based on their political views rather than the Constitution, a belief shared by 88 percent of Democrats and 39 percent of Republicans.
Voters who supported Mr. Biden in 2020 said they were disheartened 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 should end lifetime appointments to Supreme Court justices . Ms Thiel said recent court 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 in Roe v. Wade a few weeks ago,” she said. “It’s just not right. I mean, it’s just not right.
Interviews with voters who were polled revealed chasms in American society that extended far beyond political debates in Washington and extended to cultural issues that often dominate news coverage.
Conservatives voiced opposition to proposed gun control measures and gains in transgender rights, while liberals said they could not believe civil rights progress in the country had moved so slowly and that the Supreme Court had ended federal abortion rights .
Rachel Bernhardt, 62, a legal assistant from Silver Spring, Md., said her family has been involved in progressive politics since her grandfather served as an economist in the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration.
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