… In the midst of this fearsome economic environment, the Trump Administration has succeeded in navigating an unprecedented $2.3 Trillion stimulus package through a divided Congress, ensuring basic protections for businesses and workers harmed by the crisis. …
This swift, united action by Republicans in Congress suggests that they feared little censure from Republican Party identifiers in the general public—a group that is well-known for their wariness of budget deficits. Our ongoing research on deficit spending and public perceptions helps to explain why.
In our research, we examine how the incumbent president’s partisanship influences rank-and-file partisans’ concern over budget deficits and the national debt. While many scholars have recently investigated the role of incumbent partisanship in biasing the overall economic perceptions of partisans, we believe that budget deficits are a special case of this broader ‘motivated reasoning’ phenomenon. This is because unlike economic news, which can paint positive or negative pictures about an incumbent’s performance depending upon current conditions, news about deficits—a virtual constant in American government—can be summoned to serve a partisan narrative whenever a political opponent assumes office. CONT.
John V. Kane (NYU) & Ian G. Anson (UMBC), LSE USAPP