The Democrats in Congress, who must have thought that they would leave their GOP challengers in the dust in the 2018 election, must be looking in their rear-view mirrors in disbelief — a new poll shows that the once vaunted huge lead congressional Democrats held going into 2018 has plummeted to virtually nothing.
A new Monmouth University Poll, which was taken before President Trump’s State if the Union address, shows 47% of registered voters indicating they would vote for or lean toward voting for the Democratic candidate in their district compared to 45% who would support the Republican. That is an astonishing drop from last month, when a Monmouth poll found the Democrats with an enormous 15-point lead, 51% to 36%.
The shift among the public is also reflected in the poll’s numbers for President Trump; his approval rating last month was at a record low, 32%, but it has leaped to 42%. 55% of voters felt Trump has achieved some success in joining with Congress to pass his legislative agenda; in December that number stood at 42%.
As opposed to December, when only 26% of voters approved of the tax reform plan, with 47% disapproving, the voters are now equally split at 44%. Last month, 50% of voters felt their federal taxes would rise; now only 36% feel that way.
Patrick Murray, director of the independent Monmouth University Polling Institute, concluded, “The president devoted a significant amount of the State of the Union address touting a growing economy and his new tax plan. While there is still some way to go to really win over the public, it looks like the needle has moved in the Republicans’ direction since passage of the tax bill.”