“The Tide Has Turned on Party ID”

Legacy blog posts Weighting by Party

Last week, Gallup posted an analysis of the long term trend in party identification.  Unfortunately, by the time I got a chance to read Jeff Jones article, it had already gone behind Gallup’s subscription-only wall.   However, today’s Frank Newport video briefing (which is always free to non-subscribers) includes a brief summary of that analysis, so I want to pass along the link. 

The Gallup analysis looked at roughly 8,000 interviews conducted per quarter since 2004.  The bottom line (from the original Jones analysis):

Democratic identification has been remarkably consistent at roughly 33% since the beginning of last year. Republican identification fell from 35% in the first quarter of 2005 to roughly 32% since that time. Independent identification has increased from 31% to 34% during the same period.

A few weeks ago, our friend Professor Charles “Political Arithmetik” Franklin performed a similar analysis.  He also looked at trends in party identification, but he went further, applying his usual graphically intense approach to the national party identification data released by eleven different public pollsters since January 2005 (and none of these pollsters weight or adjust their results by party ID).  Franklin found essentially the same trend – a decrease in Republican identification offset by a rise in independents. 

In today’s video briefing, Frank Newport mentions some historical context also included in the Jeff Jones analysis last week: 

Past Gallup polling shows that the percentage of independents typically declines in a presidential election year — when partisan politics is at its most intense — and then usually increases in the year following the election.

What was different this time is that the increase in the independent percentage came mostly from Republicans.  Usually, in the Gallup data, both parties lose identifiers in the year following a presidential election.

Update (4/5) – promoted from the comments section:  Joran is absolutely right to recommend this “fantastic” post today by Charles Franklin on the weak relationship between party ID and presidential job approval. 

Also, be careful not to confuse party identification with vote preference.  While party ID has always been a very strong predictor of the vote, it is far from a perfect predictor.   Historically, Democratic presidential candidates have typically received a smaller percentage of Democratic identifiers than their Republican opponents.    Check the National Election Studies data on party.  The Democratic party ID advantage was much larger than it is today even in years when Republicans won lanslides — 1952 (+23), 1956 (+13), 1972 (+18), 1984 (+9). 

Mark Blumenthal

Mark Blumenthal is political pollster with deep and varied experience across survey research, campaigns, and media. The original "Mystery Pollster" and co-creator of Pollster.com, he explains complex concepts to a multitude of audiences and how data informs politics and decision-making. A researcher and consultant who crafts effective questions and identifies innovative solutions to deliver results. An award winning political journalist who brings insights and crafts compelling narratives from chaotic data.