As Democrats work toward passage of President Biden's American Rescue Plan to address the coronavirus, polling from multiple outlets keeps reinforcing that they should put the pedal to the metal on that package and more.
Fresh polling from Yahoo News/YouGov shows that most of Biden’s proposals are at least twice as popular as the opposition to them, and almost half of them are favored by more than 60% of Americans, a measure that should embolden Democrats. In essence, Biden's agenda is unifying Americans around a set of common goals—a notable achievement, particularly in these fraught times.
Nowhere is that more true than with Biden's coronavirus relief package. The survey of 1,516 U.S. adults conducted Jan. 20 - 21 found overwhelming support for Biden's key relief initiatives and even those some consider to be more controversial:
- $2000 direct payments: 74% of Americans support it, 13% oppose
- Federal vaccination funding: 69% support it, 17% oppose it
- $15 federal minimum wage: 58% support it, 31% oppose it
- National mask mandate: 57% support, 32% oppose.
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More generally, 59% agree with Biden's laser-like focus on getting the pandemic under control. Economic recovery—the second most mentioned issue—was deemed most important by just 24% of respondents.
The popularity of Biden's rescue plan has also extended to other parts of his agenda, including the economic recovery, health care, climate change, immigration, and criminal justice reform. Here's a sample:
- 65% favor “more federal funding for research and development to assist domestic manufacturing” and “investing in renewable energy infrastructure"—the foundations of Biden's recovery plan
- 64% favor "stopping family separation at the U.S.-Mexico border"
- 61% favor “creating a pathway to citizenship for young immigrants brought to the U.S. illegally as children”
- 63% favor “enacting comprehensive criminal-justice reform”
- 51% favor “providing more federal funding for community policing measures”
- 57% favor “giving all Americans the option of buying Medicare-like public health insurance”
- 57% favor “rejoining the World Health Organization”
- 54% favor “cutting carbon emissions to zero by the year 2050”
- 50% favor “reversing the recent tax cuts for Americans making more than $400,000”
Opposition to nearly all of those items tops out in the low 20s or below. Reversing the recent tax cuts is the only proposal that reaches 30% opposition.
The two places where Biden's agenda draws almost as much opposition as support relate to signature Trump items that his base is clearly still rallying around: “halting construction on the border wall with Mexico” (45% support, 42% oppose); and “ending the ban on travelers from Muslim-majority countries” (42% support, 35% oppose).
But overall, Biden's agenda and most of its critical pillars are wildly popular by any political standard, let alone an era that has been defined by division.
This has been Biden's vision of "bipartisanship" all along—uniting the public but not necessarily lawmakers. And the White House clearly knows Americans like what they see. Here's Biden chief of staff, Ron Klain, circulating the Yahoo/YouGov poll on Twitter.
As Economist data journalist G. Elliott Morris notes, “The political science here is pretty clear: passing things people want will win Democrats a whole lot more votes than pursuing ‘bipartisanship.’”
