Bad News for Trump: His Poll Numbers Went Up

Donald Trump has finally gotten over the 50 percent mark in a recent poll by Gallup.  Unfortunately for the president, it’s not for the capture of ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. It's for impeachment and removal from office.  And it’s 52 percent to be exact.

Democrats are overwhelmingly in favor of dumping the president before the 2020 election – 89 percent want him out sooner rather than later.  Only 6 percent of Republicans favor impeachment and removal. But here’s the potentially bad news for the president:  Fifty-five percent of independents now favor impeachment and removal of President Trump – and that’s up 9 points from June.

Yes, it’s true that if he is impeached he almost certainly won’t be convicted in the Senate.  But we might want to think of the independent vote for impeachment and removal from office as a proxy – for how they feel about him in general … and whether they’re likely to vote for him next year.

In 2016, Donald Trump won 46 percent of the independent vote; Hillary Clinton got only 42 percent.  Independents made up nearly a third of all voters (31 percent) last time around, and so if it’s another tight race next year, they’ll have a big say on who wins and who loses.

Let’s say they can’t bring themselves to vote for Elizabeth Warren, should she get the nomination.  That doesn’t mean they’ll stand in line to vote for Donald Trump, who a majority want tossed from the Oval Office even before his term is up.

We know how Democrats are going to vote next year, whether he’s impeached or not.  And we know how Republicans will vote.  The race will come down to turnout -- and those independents.

Gallup also measured public support for impeachment and removal of Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton and found that, “The level of support for Trump being impeached and removed is well above where it was for Clinton, and higher than it was for Nixon in all but the final poll before he resigned.”

Any time Donald Trump is compared to Richard Nixon on the subject of impeachment, that’s not a good day for Donald Trump.

So, if the number of independents who want him impeached and removed from office stays where it is now … or continues to go up … that’s bad news for the president’s chances to be re-elected.

There is a sliver of sunshine for the president, though.  Several other polls indicate that in battleground states  -- key states where elections are won and lost -- impeachment and removal from office is underwater, only a minority of voters favor it.

Donald Trump may think he can win without a plurality of independents, as long as his base turns out in big numbers.  Maybe.  But alienating independents is not usually a road to victory.