Republicans enjoy an advantage in the current election environment because more U.S. adults lean GOP and believe the party is better equipped to handle the country’s most important issues, according to a new poll.
A Gallup report out Tuesday found in an average of polls from July to September that 48% of Americans identify with or lean toward the Republican Party, while 45% identify with or lean toward the Democratic Party.
Gallup noted that Republicans previously hadn’t had an outright advantage in party affiliation in the third quarter of an election year.
American adults in Gallup’s September poll said Republicans are better than Democrats — 46% to 41% — at handling the top issues facing this country: the economy, immigration, the government and inflation. That score, Gallup said, has been “highly predictive” of election outcomes in its trends back to 1948.
“Nearly all Gallup measures that have shown some relationship to past presidential election outcomes or that speak to current perceptions of the two major parties favor the Republican Party over the Democratic Party,” Gallup said.
When it comes to keeping America prosperous, the Republican Party beats the Democratic Party by 6 points. Gallup has asked that question since 1951. Since then, the party with the advantage has won 12 of the 16 elections when one party had at least a small advantage over the other in these measures.
Republicans hold a 14-point advantage over the Democrats when it comes to which party would keep Americans safe from terrorism or international threats, according to the analysis.
Some 22% of Americans are satisfied with the way the country is going, and satisfaction levels this low have historically been associated with incumbent presidents losing reelection bids. But, in election years when there is no incumbent on the ballot, satisfaction has less strongly driven the outcome.
Gallup also noted that President Biden dropping out of the race moved presidential job approval from arguably the top election indicator to the second spot but could still affect Vice President Kamala Harris if the same frustrations are carried over.
In years when the incumbent wasn’t on the ballot, the opposite party won all the elections except in 1988, according to Gallup.
Despite the Republican advantage, the GOP doesn’t have that much of an advantage over the Democratic Party when it comes to favorability ratings. The September poll found that 43% say they have a favorable view of the Republican Party, while 42% have a favorable opinion of the Democratic Party.
The September poll also found that Ms. Harris and former President Donald Trump are still neck-and-neck in favorability, 44% to 46%, respectively.
The September poll was conducted with telephone interviews from Sept. 3-15 with a random sample of 1,007 adults. The margin of error is plus or minus 4 percentage points.
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