OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
It is common for the party in power after a presidential election to take a hit in the midterm elections, but with President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris’ abysmal poll ratings, 2022 could be the Hindenburg for Democrats.
The Republicans could be looking at massive gains like the party had when it had its tea party wins in the 2010 midterms, The Washington Examiner reported.
Democratic pollster John Zogby said that his new survey showed that independent voters are in charge of the election, and they are trending away from the Democrats.
He said that voters favor Republican control of Congress 46% to 43%, a helpful margin for the GOP that would appear to put continued Democratic control of the House and Senate out of reach.
His data also show independents swinging to Republicans. “While 93% of Democrats favor Democratic control, and 92% of Republicans favor Republican control — independents prefer Republican control of Congress 45% to 27% Democrat, leaving 28% undecided,” said his analysis of the survey of 777 likely voters nationwide, conducted Dec. 17 online. It has an overall margin of sampling error of 3.6 percentage points.
“In my four decades of polling, Democrats need about a five-percentage point advantage nationwide in congressional preference in order to maintain a majority of Congress. With a three-point Republican lead, and a substantial lead among independents, signs are pointing today to the possibility of a big Republican advantage going into 2022,” the pollster said.
In the same poll he found that Biden had a 46 percent approval rating, higher than most recent polls, but 40 percent of respondents said they “strongly” disapprove of his job performance.
“Biden’s overall numbers are borderline at 46 percent, but with 40 percent strong disapproval, his room for growth is severely limited,” the pollster said.
In another recent poll, issued by Gallup, Biden’s approval rating fell below that of the highly unpopular Vice President Harris.
The poll showed a 60 percent approval rating for Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, a 52 percent approval for NIAID head Dr. Anthony Fauci and 49 percent each for Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Attorney General Merrick Garland.
Coming in ahead of Biden and Harris was House Minority Leader and California Rep. Kevin McCarthy.
And then came Harris with an approval rating of 46 percent and Biden at 43 percent.
Others on the bottom of the poll were Democrat Senate Majority Leader and New York Sen. Charles Schumer at 44 percent and House Speaker and California Rep. Nancy Pelosi at 40 percent. Republican Senate Minority Leader and Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell with 34 a percent approval rating.
And even more stunning for Biden, a new Yahoo News/YouGov poll found that only a small fraction of the Democrats want Biden to run again in 2024.
“Perhaps as a result, just 38 percent of 2020 Biden voters say they want him to run for reelection. A full 30 percent say he should step aside. Those numbers are a little more favorable among Democrats as a whole: 43 percent and 28 percent, respectively. But they’re still fairly soft,” Yahoo reported.
“Yet the desire for an alternative — especially among Democrats — resurfaces when voters are allowed a third choice: “Someone else.” Here, a full 21 percent of registered voters opt for this other unnamed candidate, with Biden shedding about twice as much support (13 percentage points) as Trump (6 percentage points),” the report continued.
The report added:
Just one month ago, Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents were about evenly divided over whether they preferred Biden (38 percent) or someone else (41 percent) as the party’s 2024 nominee. Now fewer say Biden (32 percent), and more say they’re not sure (27 percent, up from 21 percent previously).
Biden’s backing then plummets again (to just 20 percent) when he’s matched against a hypothetical field of potential Democratic alternatives, with double-digit support for Kamala Harris (13 percent), Elizabeth Warren (11 percent), Bernie Sanders (10 percent) and Pete Buttigieg (10 percent).
Meanwhile, nearly a quarter (24 percent) say they’re not sure whom they prefer for the 2024 nomination.
Just 14 percent of independents want Biden to run again.