Parsing The Polling Numbers Post-Alito Draft

Aimée Balthazar, CC BY 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

The headline about polling numbers sure does start out heading one way….

Support for abortion rights has reached a record high, and nearly two-thirds of Americans oppose the U.S. Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade, according to a new national NBC News poll conducted after the leak of a draft opinion that would strike down the constitutional right to abortion.

What’s more, the survey finds abortion climbing up the list of issues that Americans believe are the most important, and that Democratic interest in the upcoming midterms has increased since earlier this year.

But…you could feel the “but” coming, couldn’t you. It was just such a set up for a big “but” the likes of which would make Sir Mix-a-Lot pull up quick to get with it:

But the poll also found that this Supreme Court draft opinion hasn’t substantially altered the overall political environment heading into November’s elections — with inflation and the economy remaining the public’s top issues, President Joe Biden’s job rating falling below 40 percent and a whopping 75 percent of Americans saying the country is headed in the wrong direction.

It’s the fourth straight NBC News poll with the wrong-track number higher than 70 percent, and the fifth time in the poll’s 34-year history when the wrong-track number hit 75 percent or higher.

The other times were in 2008 (during the Great Recession) and 2013 (during a government shutdown).

So, besides the “It’s the economy, stupid” factor, what is going on here with the polling numbers?

Not to oversimplify, but after nearly half a century of abortion being the hottest front in the culture wars, the trenches of that warfare are well and truly defined. There is no mass of voters out there undecided on the issue to sway either way. Now maybe the actual Supreme Court ruling in Dodds changes polling numbers, or maybe the GOP shoots themselves in the foot on the issue by overreaching/overreacting, or maybe Democrats find a messaging groove that really resonates. But that is a lot of maybes as the primary calendar sprints ahead and the midterm in November looms.

But mostly, as these polling numbers reveal again, where folks fall on the abortion debate depends on the very specific questions and circumstances surrounding. With 37% thinking abortion should always be legal, 23% mostly legal, and 37% thinking it should be illegal on the main question, getting a “consensus” involves combining things, and the numbers on abortion start fragmenting more and more with additional caveats and circumstances added. All that adds up to an issue that polls one way, but digitizes out in ways that don’t make it a clear-cut needle moving issue at the ballot box.

While it has already driven an uptick in fundraising and engagement on the Democratic side, the search for a magic single thing that will push against historical trends and current events to keep the Democratic Party in control off all three branches of government come December continues. The senate will be a very tight race for a majority, the House continues to look like a matter of “how much by, not will” Team Blue loses the majority there, and of course all the down ballot races to be decided.

Plenty can still happen between now and November, but the Supreme Court in June doesn’t look like it will be a deciding factor.