An NBC News analysis of historical polling data reveals that lawmakers have not suffered a significant political cost in previous government shutdowns, despite Republican leaders on Capitol Hill rushing to salvage a government funding deal after President-elect Donald Trump helped sabotage an early accord.
As Trump and his supporters, notably billionaire Elon Musk, urged Republicans to back out of a bipartisan financing agreement that was announced this week, some shutdown advocates have been bringing up this argument.
Republicans and President Trump shouldn’t fear a government shutdown. According to a post on X by former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, the next election is in two years. We won the first reelected House GOP majority since 1928 and had two shutdowns in 1995.
In reference to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., Gingrich added, “Schumer and Democrats may need shock therapy to realize President Trump is serious about draining the swamp.”
According to the American Presidency Project, Republicans won two Senate seats and nine House seats in the 1996 elections, despite President Bill Clinton’s reelection.
More recent shutdowns have been attributed to Republicans, but government budget standoffs have not played a significant role in the elections that followed.
Trump’s first term included the most recent government shutdown. It was the longest in American history, lasting 35 days, from December 2018 to January 2019.
Before a funding agreement was reached, an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll conducted in January 2019 revealed that 37% of Americans blamed Democrats in Congress for the closure, while 50% of Americans blamed Trump. However, Trump’s approval rating of 43% in that same study remained the same as a poll conducted before the closure.
71% of Americans at the time reported that neither they nor a family member had been impacted by the closure, while 28% reported that they had.
The closure was not seen as a significant role in a campaign that was dominated by the pandemic and other events, even though Trump obviously lost the election the following year.
During the first government shutdown in almost 20 years in 2013, the GOP did suffer a significant decline in polling, but it was short-lived. Republicans, led by Texas Senator Ted Cruz, and Democrats were at odds over funds to administer the Affordable Care Act, which was then President Barack Obama’s signature health care bill, at the time of that shutdown.
According to an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll conducted at the time, 31% of Americans blamed Obama for the impasse, while the majority (53%) blamed Republicans. Additionally, compared to 2019, the GOP’s popularity plummeted, with only 24% expressing a favorable opinion of the party.
In the 2013 study, 47% of respondents said they would prefer a Democratic-controlled Congress, while 39% said they would prefer a GOP-controlled Congress, giving Democrats an 8-point advantage on the congressional ballot.
But things changed significantly over the next year-plus, and the 2014 midterms had different results. In addition to seizing control of the Senate, Republicans rode a red wave to their greatest House majority in decades. The 2013 closure was eventually surpassed by other problems, such as the shaky introduction of internet portals for Obamacare health insurance enrollment.
This year’s most recent impasse also coincides with a high degree of pessimism toward the divided nation.
According to the most recent poll conducted by NBC News in November, 28% of voters predicted that the country will become more united after the election of the next president, while 60% of respondents said that it would stay sharply divided.
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