What happens when a president and Congressional leaders in his own party disagree on important policy issues? This is quite uncommon these days, but in December 2020 and January 2021, it happened. President Donald Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell publicly differed on a highly salient issue: stimulus checks.
The second round of pandemic relief included a provision that Americans be issued $600 checks, the figure McConnell preferred. However, Trump wanted $2,000 checks instead, the same amount Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats in Congress had been calling for. How do partisan voters respond to such visible policy splits between Republican leaders? Do voters care that in this instance Trump aligned more with Pelosi than with McConnell? And does that change their view on how big they think stimulus checks should be?
To address these questions, we conducted a survey experiment in early January 2021. CONTINUED
Eric Loepp (U. of Wisconsin-Whitewater) & Jarrod Kelly (North Carolina Wesleyan), Mischiefs of Faction