Despite the president’s incessant parroting of the “perfect phone call” line, nearly three-quarters of Americans believe Donald Trump’s actions as it relates to the Ukraine fiasco were wrong.
On the bright side for Trump, that doesn’t mean that public support for impeachment and/or removal from office is overwhelming.
After the first week of public hearings in the impeachment inquiry, an Ipsos poll of 506 adults shows the following breakdown:
Unfortunately for the White House, that would appear to suggest that the only Americans who think the president’s actions weren’t wrong, are members of his base. That’s an admittedly superficial assessment, but it seems reasonable to say that if you had to put a number on what percentage of voters comprise Trump’s hardcore following (and that doesn’t necessarily have to mean they agree with each and every thing the president says and does, but rather that when it comes to something like pressuring a foreign government to investigate political rivals, they’re likely to side with him) 25% would be a reasonable guesstimate.
The interviews were conducted from November 16 to November 17, which means those polled would have had the opportunity to see Marie Yovanovitch and Bill Taylor testify publicly.
More than a fifth of those surveyed said they made up their mind about whether Trump’s actions were or weren’t wrong following those public hearings.
27% said their mind was made up before hearing directly from the ambassadors. Amusingly, 32% said they had decided before the news about Trump and Ukraine was first reported, which is technically impossible because the question asks specifically about the president’s actions in Ukraine.
58% of Americans said they’re following the hearings very closely or somewhat closely. As ABC notes, of the 21% who said they made up their minds about impeachment after the first week of public hearings, “60% think that Trump should be impeached and removed from office”.
In any event, the broad strokes takeaway is that a slim majority of Americans think Trump’s actions were bad enough that he should be impeached and removed from office, while 70% say he did something wrong.
That latter figure certainly seems to be larger than the number of GOP lawmakers who are willing to admit that using $391 million in taxpayer dollars to bribe a foreign government into interfering in America’s elections isn’t consistent with democratic norms.
I’ve always estimates trumps base to be around 30%
A president who was elected with fewer votes than his opponent who is being protected by a minority party that has gerrymandered its way into control of the Senate. Don’t know what to call it, but sure doesn’t pass the democracy smell test.