Blamed GOP for shutdown....

Poll: More voters blamed Trump and GOP for shutdown than Democrats

By STEVEN SHEPARD

Democrats blinked first in the shutdown standoff, but it wasn't public polling that pushed them to capitulate.

While Republicans gloated over a Senate vote to reopen the government on Monday — celebrating the Democrats’ decision to accept a three-week extension in funding in exchange for a future vote on immigration policy — voters weren’t necessarily blaming Democrats in large numbers for the shutdown.

According to a new POLITICO/Morning Consult poll conducted Saturday and Sunday, a combined 48 percent of voters said Trump (34 percent) and Republicans in Congress (15 percent) were to blame for the shutdown — more than the 35 percent who said congressional Democrats bore most of the blame.

And a majority of voters, 53 percent, thought President Donald Trump hadn’t done enough to bring the parties together — compared to only 29 percent who thought Trump had done enough.

After the Senate vote to approve government funding through February 8, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said he will give bipartisan negotiators three more weeks to reach a broader deal on immigration policy — and, if they can’t, he will permit a vote to codify protections for undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. as children.

Those immigrants, who have enjoyed protection under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program in recent years, were the main sticking point for most Democrats. Republicans felt in recent days that they were winning the political argument over the shutdown.

But the POLITICO/Morning Consult poll actually shows an increase in the percentage of voters who thought passing a DACA fix was worth shutting down the government.

"As Democrats consider their next move, our polling shows an uptick in voter support for shutting down the government over protections for 'Dreamers,'" said Morning Consult co-founder and Chief Research Officer Kyle Dropp. "In a poll taken before the shutdown, 42 percent of voters said this issue was important enough to prompt a government shutdown, compared with 47 percent of voters who say the same today."

Fewer voters, 38 percent, say DACA is not important enough to shut down the government — down from 42 percent immediately before the shutdown.

On the other hand, significantly fewer voters say it’s worth shutting down the government to secure funding for Trump’s main immigration priority: a wall along the Mexican border. Fewer than three-in-10 voters, 29 percent, say a border wall is worth shutting down the government over, while 57 percent say the wall isn’t worth it.

And most voters identified DACA as the main reason for the shutdown: 64 percent said they thought the shutdown was occurring over DACA, more than identified the border wall (44 percent) as a driving force behind the shutdown.

The deal struck on Monday gives both parties three more weeks to frame their arguments over immigration and government funding. Previous surveys have shown widespread support for allowing DACA recipients to stay in the U.S. — and broad opposition to a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Voters are more likely to say it’s worth shutting down the government to secure increases in defense spending: 51 percent say those increases are worth risking a shutdown, while a third say they aren’t.

The POLITICO/Morning Consult poll surveyed 1,997 registered voters and has a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points.