Hispanic voters are nearly three times more prevalent in states that gained congressional seats and Electoral College votes in the 2010 reapportionment than they are in states that lost seats.
There will almost certainly be far more nonvoters than voters this year. Nonvoters are younger, less educated and more financially stressed than likely voters. They are also significantly less Republican and more likely to approve of Obama’s job performance.
Republicans continue to hold a solid lead in preferences for Tuesday’s midterm elections among likely voters — enough so as to suggest they will win control of the House. The GOP owes its lead to strong backing from independents and record-levels of engagement among its partisans.
The latest Congressional Connection poll finds most in the public are in no mood for political compromising. Also, Americans split evenly on which political party could best handle the economy while four-in-ten say eliminating tax cuts for the wealthy would hurt the economy.
Two years ahead of the next presidential election, the public is divided (47% yes, 42% no ) over whether Barack Obama should run for a second term. However, this is better than the outlook for Ronald Reagan in August 1982
While a majority of Americans favors allowing changes to Social Security, there is very little support for replacing Medicare with a voucher system. Also, the public continues to see no clear leader atop the GOP.
Mexicans overwhelmingly continue to endorse President Calderón’s campaign against the drug cartels and most — though somewhat fewer than a year ago — see progress in the drug war. But opposition to direct U.S. involvement has increased, and Mexican views of the U.S. generally turned negative following passage of the recent Arizona immigration law.
The American public’s sour mood is in interesting contrast with many of the public’s views during the Great Depression of the 1930s, not only on economic, political and social issues, but also on the role of government in addressing them.
Pluralities say that coverage of poor people and Muslims is too negative, while somewhat smaller percentages say the same about coverage of blacks and Hispanics. About a third say that coverage of wealthy people is too positive — the highest percentage for any group tested.