Americans may still be divided about President Donald Trump, but large majorities favor a congressional probe into the resignation of his National Security Advisor and allegations of Russian tampering with the 2016 election.
Those majorities include most Democrats and even about half of all Republicans, according to the latest SurveyMonkey poll of 1,518 adults nationwide conducted from February 15 through 17, 2017.
Sixty-two percent of Americans favor “a congressional investigation into claims that Russia attempted to disrupt the U.S. elections last year,” according to the new poll, while 36 percent oppose.
A larger number (67 percent) favors such an investigation into the events leading to Flynn’s resignation, while 30 percent oppose.
So far, more Americans reject than accept President Trump’s response to stories about Flynn’s resignation. When offered a choice, more Americans say they are bothered by “alleged contacts between the Trump campaign and Russian intelligence officials” (45 percent) than by “news media leaks from U.S. intelligence agencies about contacts by the Trump campaign” (32 percent).
Partisanship helps drive the difference, although Democrats are more bothered by the possibility of Russian contacts with the Trump campaign (79 percent) than Republicans are bothered by news media leaks from U.S. intelligence agencies (59 percent).
While Republican leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives have so far rejected calls for Congressional investigations into possible ties between Trump’s campaign and the Russian government, Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell says a probe by the Senate Intelligence campaign into Flynn’s discussions with the Russian ambassador is “highly likely.”
Perhaps reflecting the split among Republican party leaders, the prospect of investigations into Russian tampering and Flynn’s resignation serves to divide Republicans while uniting Democrats nationwide. The overwhelming majority of Democrats (84 percent) favor a Congressional investigation into Russian election tampering (and 15 percent) oppose, while Republicans are more split, with 41 percent in favor and 58 percent opposed. A large majority of independents (64 percent) favor a Congressional probe while 35 percent oppose.
Similarly, on a proposed investigation of the events leading to Flynn’s resignation, Democrats are again overwhelmingly supportive (86 percent in favor and 13 percent opposed), while Republicans are more narrowly divided (48 percent in favor and 50 percent opposed). Better than two-thirds of independents (69 percent) favor a Flynn investigation and 29 percent oppose it.
Supporters of these congressional investigations feel more strongly about the issue than opponents. The intensity gap is better than two-to-one (41 percent strongly favor to 16 percent strongly oppose) for an investigation into Russia’s role in the election and better than three-to-one (38 percent strongly favor to 11 percent strongly oppose) for a probe into Flynn’s resignation.
That gap may result from the Americans paying the most attention to Flynn’s resignation. Better than two-thirds (68 percent) have been following the story as least somewhat closely, and nearly a third (31 percent) say they have been following it very closely.
Partisans on both sides are paying attention to the Flynn news, with similar numbers of Democrats (71 percent) and Republicans (67 percent) following it at least somewhat closely. However, support for an investigation into either Flynn’s resignation or Russian tampering in the election is greater among those following the story than among those not paying much attention.
So far, at least, the events of the week have made no difference to the President’s job rating, with 46 percent expressing approval for the way Trump is handling his job as president in interviews conducted since Monday and 53 percent disapproval (both numbers unchanged from the previous week).
Methodology: This SurveyMonkey Tracking poll was conducted online February 15-17, 2017 among a national sample of 1,518 adults ages 18 and up. Respondents for this survey were selected from the nearly 3 million people who take surveys on the SurveyMonkey platform each day. Data for this week have been weighted for age, race, sex, education, and geography using the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey to reflect the demographic composition of the United States. Detailed breakdowns of the results can be viewed here. This entry is cross-posted to the SurveyMonkey Election Tracking blog.