Trump Is In a Unique Position Amid Impeachment
Public opinion of the president falls ‘between the two extremes’ of two targeted predecessors, Nixon and Clinton
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As House Democrats pursue their impeachment investigation of President Trump, a new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll finds that he is in a much different political position than two predecessors who were impeachment targets, Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton.
The new survey found that a majority of Americans support an inquiry into accusations that Mr. Trump tried to pressure Ukraine to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden, one of his main political rivals. But the survey did not find majority support for removing Mr. Trump from office. Mr. Trump says he has done nothing wrong.
(You can read the full poll results here.)
A look at past presidents facing impeachment finds that Mr. Trump is in a unique situation. The public had an overwhelmingly negative view of Mr. Nixon by the time the House began its impeachment inquiry of him, which came after a cascade of Watergate-related revelations had played out in the news for more than a year. Only 25% of Americans approved of Mr. Nixon’s overall job performance at the time, pollster Jeff Horwitt reports. Not even half of Republicans gave Mr. Nixon a positive job rating.
Some 38% supported Mr. Nixon’s removal from office when the impeachment inquiry opened, Mr. Horwitt says—a higher share than the share who approved of Mr. Nixon’s job performance.
Mr. Clinton had a broad base of support when the House began its impeachment investigation. Some 68% of Americans approved of his overall job performance at the time, including three-quarters of independents and nearly 40% of Republicans.
Some 24% supported Mr. Clinton’s removal from office, Mr. Horwitt reports – a far lower share than who approved of his job performance.
Mr. Trump, by contrast, wins positive job ratings from 43% of Americans in the new Journal/NBC News survey.
And an equal 43% share supports removing him from office when poll respondents were asked a yes-no question of whether lawmakers should impeach him and usher him from the White House. (Some 49% oppose impeachment.)
While we often look to history for guidance, “here, we are in uncharted territory,’’ said Mr. Horwitt, a Democrat, who worked on the Journal/NBC News survey with Republican pollster Bill McInturff.
Where the public largely abandoned Mr. Nixon, and Mr. Clinton had support from a meaningful share of the opposing party, Mr. Trump has cut his own profile, maintaining deep support from a relatively narrow segment of the public. He has consistently won overwhelmingly strong job approval marks from his own party, almost no support from Democrats and approval numbers among independents in the high 30s or low 40s.
Mr. Trump falls “between the two extremes of Clinton (high job approval) and Nixon (very low job approval),” Mr. McInturff said in an email. “But Trump’s job approval so far has been fixed, stable and difficult to move one way or another during his entire presidency.”
The open question is whether the Ukraine investigation will move Mr. Trump’s numbers after prior controversies have not.
Write to Aaron Zitner at Aaron.Zitner@d
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