Impeachment...

Poll: Support for Trump impeachment rises

By STEVEN SHEPARD

An increasing percentage of voters want Congress to impeach President Donald Trump — even if they don't think Trump has committed the “high crimes and misdemeanors” the Constitution requires.

Forty-three percent of voters want Congress to begin impeachment proceedings, according to a new POLITICO/Morning Consult poll, up from 38 percent last week.

"If President Trump was hoping his foreign trip would shift the conversation away from scandals, he may be out of luck," said Morning Consult Co-Founder and Chief Research Officer Kyle Dropp. "Over the last week, support for beginning impeachment proceedings among voters rose from 38 percent to 43 percent."

But that's still less than the 45 percent who don't want Congress to impeach Trump, down a tick from 46 percent the week before.

Only three American presidents in history have faced legitimate impeachment threats.

Much of the support for impeaching Trump comes from political considerations, the poll shows — not a belief that Trump is actually guilty of impeachable offenses, like treason, bribery or obstructing justice.

Of those who want Congress to move toward impeachment, a 54-percent majority of those believe Trump “has proven he is unfit to serve and should be removed from office, regardless of whether he committed an impeachable offense or not.” Only 43 percent of those seeking impeachment believe Trump has committed an offense that meets the high constitutional standards for removal.

The results underscore the intense partisan divisions following last year’s rancorous election. A wide majority of self-identified Democratic voters, 71 percent, want Congress to impeach Trump. But more than three-quarters of GOP voters, 76 percent, don’t think Congress should begin impeachment proceedings.

Despite the sharp split on impeachment, Trump’s approval ratings as president have stabilized, the poll shows. For the second consecutive week, 45 percent of voters approve of the job Trump is doing, while half disapprove. That has recovered from a low of 41 percent prior to Trump’s trip overseas this month.

While poll respondents were not asked explicitly to react to Trump’s first foreign trip, the poll shows voters are skeptical of Trump’s aspirations to help Israel and the Palestinians strike a long-sought peace deal. Only 9 percent think it’s very likely Trump will be able to broker such an agreement. More say it’s either somewhat likely (18 percent), not too likely (28 percent) or not likely at all (31 percent).

The POLITICO/Morning Consult poll was conducted May 25-30, beginning just after the Congressional Budget Office weighed in on Trump’s chief legislative goal in the opening months of his presidency: the health care bill the House passed earlier this month. The CBO’s report projected the bill, if enacted, would save the federal government $119 billion over the next decade, but 23 million fewer Americans would have health insurance.

The poll shows more voters continue to disapprove of the GOP health care bill, 47 percent, than approve, 38 percent. And the 33 percent who disapprove of the bill “strongly” far outpaces the 14 percent who approve strongly.

A 47-percent plurality of voters think the bill would make the U.S. health care system worse — more than the 32 percent who think it would make the system better. Twenty-two percent say it won’t make a difference on the health care system.

Forty-seven percent of voters also believe the bill will increase their health care costs, while only 18 percent think it will lower their costs and 17 percent don’t think it will have an impact.

Last week’s CBO report is unlikely to improve voter perceptions of the bill. Told about both the bill’s deficit savings and the reductions in health insurance coverage, only 20 percent say it would make them more likely to support the bill. Nearly twice as many, 39 percent, say it makes them more likely to oppose the measure.

The POLITICO/Morning Consult poll included interviews with 1,991 registered voters and has a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points.