Senate races: GOP up in Texas, Tennessee; Dems up in Arizona, New Jersey

The battle for Senate control finds Democrats trying to mount upset challenges in a string of typically Republican states, and this round of Battleground Tracker polls shows them having at best mixed results so far. … By more than two to one, registered voters say national issues outweigh local ones, […] Read more »

Bitter Tenor of Senate Reflects a Nation at Odds With Itself

… To the right and left alike, Judge Kavanaugh’s nomination appears less like a final spasm of division — a sobering trauma, followed by calm resolution — than an event that deepens the national mood of turbulence. The country is gripped by a climate of division and distrust rivaled by […] Read more »

Understanding ‘the white women thing’

Donald Trump likes to brag that most women in America voted for him for president. Like many things the president says, that’s just not true. Most women, 54 percent, voted for Hillary Clinton. However, 52 percent of white women did vote for Trump — and that’s the cohort that drives […] Read more »

Here’s why confirming Kavanaugh could seriously undermine the Supreme Court’s public standing

Could Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination undermine the public standing of the Supreme Court? Observers such as the Atlantic’s Ron Brownstein think so. “Every time [Chief Justice John] Roberts would lean on Kavanaugh to construct a majority,” Brownstein writes, “the chief justice could further erode the Court’s already eroding public confidence.” In […] Read more »

Republicans Rescued Kavanaugh’s Nomination By Making It About #MeToo

Brett Kavanaugh seemed like the dream Supreme Court nominee for Republican voters and activists when he was nominated in mid-July. He had the résumé and experience to be confirmed relatively easily, but also a clear ideological background that suggested he would join the conservatives already on the high court in […] Read more »

Partisanship Trumps Gender: Sexual Harassment, Woman Candidates, Access to Contraception, and Key Issues in 2018 Midterms

Amid the bitter confirmation fight over Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination for the Supreme Court, now hinging on sexual-assault allegations, and the battle for control of Congress, PRRI today released a new survey exploring Americans’ attitudes toward sexual harassment, support for female political candidates, access to contraception, and key issues in […] Read more »