Free Republic

In 2020, President Joe Biden set a record as the presidential candidate to receive the most votes ever in U.S. history. And now, over a year and a half into this first term, he is setting a new record but it’s probably one he won’t be bragging about: how high his disapproval rating is at this point in his presidency. CNN’s senior data reporter, Harry Enten, made an appearance on “AC 360” to discuss the president’s abysmal approval rating with host Anderson Cooper. Enten shared a slide that showed Biden’s disapproval rating seven months ago was at 50% and a...

(CNN)Rep. Liz Cheney has become an unexpected hero for Democrats. She was one of the few Republicans to vote to impeach President Donald Trump last year, has served as one of his most vocal critics in the GOP and is the vice chair of the House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the US Capitol. But we shouldn't mistake adoring press coverage and bipartisan bona fides for popularity in the place where popularity matters most for Cheney: Wyoming. A look at the data reveals that Cheney should be regarded as the clear underdog in her efforts to...

CNN’s senior data reporter Harry Enten said Monday on “The Lead” that Republicans will win a massive majority in the U.S. House of Representatives in the November midterm elections. Anchor Jake Tapper said, “If you’re a Republican running for re-election or trying to unseat a Democrat, things are looking pretty good, right?”

(CNN)President Joe Biden's approval rating is at its lowest point since he took office. His approval rating has slid into the low 40s this month. And while the President has plenty of time to recover before his potential reelection in 2024, history suggests that his chances of becoming popular and Democrats gaining ground by the midterms in 2022 are small. Take a look at every president's net approval rating (approval - disapproval) since the end of World War II. Biden's at about -9 points net approval rating right now. Specifically, we'll examine all elected presidents at this point into their...

The two most monumental events of the last year in the US were the election of Joe Biden to the presidency and the introduction of Covid-19 vaccines. Yet there are those who falsely believe Biden won only because of fraud or that they shouldn't get a vaccine.Take a look at the most recent Monmouth University poll, one of the few to ask about both people's vaccine status and how they view the 2020 election result.Not having received a vaccine was a minority position, at 34%, at the time of the poll in mid-June. Thinking Biden won only because of...

The Republican efforts to change voting laws around the country after Donald Trump's 2020 loss are often all lumped together as one push. And while they almost all seek to ameliorate fear of widespread fraud that no one has proven exists, the modifications sought actually fall into two distinct groups. You have proposed bills that seek to change how people vote and ones that propose to change how votes are counted. The former has received much of the attention from Democrats trying to counter Republicans, but it is the latter that is by far a clearer threat to democracy. Recall...

...One of the biggest divides in the adult vaccination map has been the blue/red state divide I spoke about last week. Concentrating on the top 25 states for vaccinations of children, President Joe Biden won 22 of them in last year's election. This includes him winning all the top 19. This is similar to him winning 21 of the top 25 states for vaccinations of adults. Likewise, there is a large socioeconomic divide. When it comes to the educational divide, 20 of the top 25 states for child vaccinations are where the number of adults with college degrees is above...

A big question heading into this cycle was whether Democrats' best path to winning back the White House ran through the Sunbelt or the Great Lakes (i.e. Rust Belt). While we won't know for certain which pathway was best for them until the votes are actually counted, the current data shows a pretty clear divide. If former Vice President Joe Biden is to win this election, his best chance probably runs through the Great Lakes... Hillary Clinton won contests containing 232 electoral votes. Were Biden to hold the Clinton states (and polls indicate that he probably will), he needs to...

CNN is sounding the alarm for the Democrats, warning in a piece on Tuesday that former Vice President Joe Biden is underperforming while President Donald Trump is over-performing with black voters. “Joe Biden’s advantage over Trump with Black voters is currently smaller than Hillary Clinton’s was,” read the headline on Tuesday from CNN’s Harry Enten. The opening paragraphs of Enten’s article note that despite Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests nationwide since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, the incumbent GOP president is outperforming expectations against the presumptive Democrat nominee in the black community. Despite a drop for Trump in...

Now that the race for the 2020 Democratic nomination has officially started, one of the big issues that will likely come up is which candidate is the most electable. One way to find that out is to see how the different possible candidates have done in the past. Of course, it's difficult to compare candidates when they run for different offices in different years. There are, however, six potential 2020 Democratic contenders ran who ran for the US Senate in 2018. The big takeaway from those results: Sens. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota and Sherrod Brown of Ohio are above-average candidates...

GOP could still keep House majority 04:28 (CNN)House forecast: Democrats will win 226 seats (and the House majority) while Republicans will win just 209 seats. A Democratic win of 203 seats and 262 seats is within the margin of error. Senate forecast: Republicans will hold 52 seats (and maintain control of the Senate) next Congress while Democrats will hold just 48. Anything between Republicans holding 48 seats and 56 seats is within the margin of error. The final weekend of the long 2018 campaign is coming to a close. Sometimes the final weekend brings clarity. This weekend brings no such...

(CNN)House forecast: Democrats will win 228 seats

The political future of President Donald Trump and the Republican Party over the next two years really comes down to one question: Do traditional measures of popularity mean anything when it comes to Trump? If they do, the Republican Party and Trump could be in major trouble. Usually, we wouldn't even think to ask whether a president with around a 40% approval rating would end up hurting his political party. Yet Trump did something that was seemingly impossible in 2016: He won the presidency, despite being the most unpopular candidate since at least 1952 and with Americans seeming to like...