May 4th, 2022 – Second Reading Podcast

Welcome to the second reading podcast from the university of Texas at Austin, the Republicans were in the democratic party because there was only one party. So I tell people on a regular basis, there is still a land of opportunity in America. It’s called Texas. The problem is these departures from the constitution.

They have become the norm. At what point must a female Senator raise her hand or her voice to be recognized. Over the male colleagues in the room.

And welcome back to the second reading podcast. I’m Jim Henson, director of the Texas politics project at the university of Texas at Austin. Uh, very happy to be joined today by two of my colleagues and collaborators. Darren sharp professor of government and in the department of government at the university of Texas at Austin, he also holds the Frank senior when junior chair of state politics holding a nut relinquishing at this point, yes, plopping down.

He is plopped down in the Erwin chair. And also of course, Joshua blank research director for the Texas politics project and a PhD of course, from this Augusta university under the supervision of professor Shaw, I might add that’s right. I just sit in a normal chair back in the day. Well, you’re in kind of.

Uh, so we are here today to talk about, uh, as we record on Wednesday morning, a set of data that we just released from our, our April university of Texas, Texas politics, project poll, which had a lot of stuff in it. So without too much ado, let’s just dive in. You know, let’s just start with the headline.

Sorry guys. I think, um, and start with abortion. Of course, this week, the news has been dominated by the leak of a, what is has been confirmed, I guess, by chief justice, John Roberts, as a draft of an opinion written by Samuel Alito on. The abortion case that is pending before the court. And then this draft at least, uh, the justice as is very unambiguous about overturning Roe V.

Wade there’s really like, I don’t think it’s any. Anybody can read that and not think that despite all of our, uh, uh, speculation before that maybe there would be a more moderate path here that speculation on the possibility that there would be, um, at least so far. And we should, you know, all, you know, caveats about.

Right. Everybody’s you know, core scholars and members of the quarter saying, you know, look, this is an early draft. It was dated in February. Decision’s not going to be handed down for awhile. And it’s very frequent that these first straps get revised substantially to maintain a majority. And. So it’s an ongoing negotiation process between the justices to receive a majority of the votes on the court.

And so one draft is a draft, but right. I mean, you know, th the assumption is that they have at least something of a majority, but at any rate, we don’t know that this is going to happen, but that’s the backdrop to this and amidst all this. We had two questions on the poll that spoke to, um, Abortion in particular, the scenario in which Roe V.

Wade is overturned and this in turn, then activates the so-called trigger law in Texas and other states in which abortion becomes illegal across the board. Uh, 30 days after the implementation of. With no exceptions as I understand the law. So Josh, why don’t you start by talking about the results? Sure.

Well, to the one that you just mentioned, and we’ve asked this question four times now, basically going back to when the legislature started discussing the trigger bill, uh, back during the regular session. Uh, last year and we’ve had really consistent results. And this is something I think people should know about abortion attitudes generally can come back to this point, but you know, you don’t see a lot of jumping around in terms of the distribution of responses to abortion items.

So we’ve consistently found about 55, 54, 50 5% of Texans, opposed to an automatic ban on all abortions, uh, in the service center describing. About 35% of the most recent poll, a little under, a little more than a third in support of this. And the rest are basically the, I don’t know. I don’t know what to think about this.

I don’t know where I’m uncommitted. Right. So, so, so Darren, you pulled a lot on this, both here and elsewhere, but you know, you, you know, been around the block in Texas a few times. What do you make of this? Well, the, I guess the macro observation I would offer is that. Public opinion suddenly becomes really important on abortion because what the, what the court is essentially doing, and this is pretty clear in the draft opinion is to leave this up to the, to the states and localities in the states and localities.

You’ll presumably more sensitive to fluctuations in public opinion than the court was. And simply saying the row establishes a right to privacy and, you know, restrictions are therefore subject to strict scrutiny at the very least like, like a lot of other sort of fundamental freedoms. So. Opinion becomes more relevant.

It’s always been relevant in conversations. And we’ve asked Roe V. Wade questions and pro-choice pro-life questions forever. Um, what we do in this poll, as Josh mentioned, uh, we have a particular question about, about the trigger, which is an automatic ban and yeah, you get about 34% who support 34, 30 5% support that about 54% of pose.

Um, we ask and have asked since really the inception of the poll, kind of a more, some question derive from a question that appeared in the national election study for years. About under what circumstances, if any, right. Would you permit abortion? And I smiling, Darren, we’re not laughing at you because we were both talking about this question and I was talking around, which I, I hate explaining this question.

Well, I was thinking, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s both more subtle than that’s the underlying opinions. It’s just, it’s just the, it’s just the nature of the question. Well, but, but, you know, it’s the nature of the opinion space here. I mean, this question is both more, in some ways it’s both more subtle and not settling.

Right. I think, I think that criticism is right. And for, for the listeners, it’s a question that offers four response categories on, on each pole. Uh, there’s sort of a strict, um, option, which is bylaw on the one pole bylaw. Abortion should never be permitted. And then the other pole by law, a woman should always be able to obtain an abortion as a matter of personal choice.

So those are the kind of the polls that anchor it. And you get 15% saying never and 39% saying. Um, it’s the middle options that I think frustrated Jim probably, um, which is the, the one middle option is the law should permit abortion only in cases of rape incest or when the mother’s life is in danger.

Now that really kind of moves more towards a pro-life. Type opinion. That’s how we categorize. So oftentimes we’ll collapse, the never permit abortion or only permitted in cases of rape incest, et cetera, is about 28% in that category. Right. So if you, you know, you could add those two up as being the nominally pro pro-life and then the other middle caption is by law.

Um, the law should permit abortion for reasons. Then rape ancestor danger, but only after the need for the abortion has been clearly established. I think that’s what Josh and Jim probably hate. Certainly what I hate. And actually it’s not a, it’s not a clean version of the. Rip off of the NES version of this, but, but it’s essentially these middle two options are designed to get at this notion that, well, I’m not saying always, I’m not saying never.

The question is under what circumstances. And I think there’s a lot of pushback that people to be self-critical, there’s a pushback people could have about, well, Is that second middle position, really a pro choice or is it closer to pro-life? Anyway, th the distribution is 15. Say never, you know, uh, 39%, roughly 40% say always.

And then 28% say, Hey, only in cases of rape incest or endangerment, another 11% say. Well, certainly a woman should have a right to an abortion in those cases, but probably some others, but they have to be specified. Right. So if you add those middle categories together, you get 39, 40%. Um, so this is a long winded way of saying we, we both love and hate this question because on the love side, it shows that people think they’re just, you know, nothing but strong pro-lifers are pro-choice or.

Overstating things a little bit. Um, but there is a question. If, if, if the fundamental question at hand is under what circumstances should abortion be restricted, we’re not entirely sure that we’re getting. Properly. And this is why we ask the specific questions yet. Yeah. I mean, I agree with you and I think of it just slightly differently.

I mean, you kind of got there where I would get, which is, I think those middle two categories show where generally most voters are and what they show is that, you know, when you kind of take away the way the discussion is, which is sort of, should we always have access to abortion? Should there never be abortion?

What you really find is. Most people are somewhere as they will. When yeah. What are you like? You know, what are the circumstances you’re talking about? Right. And we do have it, we have asked other questions. In fact, just as recently as last year, we did a different battery of questions was asked specific circumstances under which a woman should be able to expert, as you just said right now, where are you saying woman?

We’re saying, man, it’s another layer of sort of information that, you know, like I would just say acknowledge that we could say a person and a person. I understand why, and I, I, but like for the sake of, you know, looking at public opinion, polling where we’re tracking questions over time, right now we’re a little bit, we’re definitely stuck with the trend on some of these things.

So just, you know, if you, if you’re listening to this and it’s cringing, because we’re saying we’re talking about this in a certain way, I just want to say, I’m sorry, I’m talking about the polling results. I’m just, I’m just apologizing in advance about this, but as we ask about the situation, Yeah, a woman or a person should be able to obtain a legal abortion.

We, I think we have eight circumstances ranging from again, you know, uh, her health or life is in danger. You know, the pregnancy was the result of rape or incest. And we talk about other circumstances, you know, economic considerations, if there’s fetal defects or abnormalities, A range of opinions. And so when we started talking about pro-life, pro-choice, you know, we’re looking at, you know, Texas hurdling towards banding access to abortion, and you have a lot of, I think, you know, statewide leaders are taking the surf camp, almost premature victory lap, and saying, this is the most pro-life state in the country.

We’re going to make it that way. But we asked people to define themselves as pro-life or pro-choice and we get in Texas repeatedly equal sheriffs say pro-life and pro-choice now again, that’s because to be, just to bring this background, Because we’re making a very complicated issue, way too simple. And so that’s where we ended up was on the move.

We asked that we tuck it in the back. We talk it in the back after anything else. Yeah. Is this for the listeners know? I mean, you, you ask not invasive questions, but certainly questions that assume a familiarity with Selma. And we’re not asking about whether somebody has, has had a procedure in the past.

We’re simply asking their opinion on the attitude, but we do tend to put it in the back because we’re, we’re concerned that people will. Intrusive and terminate the conversation, right. So, you know, it’ll, it’ll affect their response. Exactly. Exactly. And as Josh mentioned, it’s not, you know, from a pollsters perspective, are people interested in public opinion?

It’s not only the circumstances. Well, now it’s the. So we’ve got what weeks? And then again, I know that like some of the arguments are underlying a lot of this discussion right now. You know, I know that a lot and let’s see on the progressive side and especially among feminists would say that this decision was actually always kind of wrong because they should have focused on.

Yeah, basically the economic determinism and Liberty of the woman as a person and not based on somebody’s timing, but when you look at public opinion, what’s actually interesting to me about it, kind of in thinking about this stuff, a new, uh, really deeply is the fact that, you know, that sort of timeline framework really actually meets the public where it is, because it actually takes out these extreme circumstance and say, okay, within this timeframe, You figure out what circumstances work for you, your faith, your family, because they vary significantly across people.

But you know, what we’re having at this point is, you know, I think it’s true in Texas and it’s true in Texas too. In a lot of other places you’re having a policy that’s really only favored by. Between one and five and one in 10 voters now actually driving the state forward here. And so, I mean, that’s the speaks to this whole question of like, so what are the consequences just to where I want to go next?

So let’s, let’s do that. So I want to set that. I mean, I want to. I want us to talk a little bit about what we think the implications of this are just so happens to be an election year in Texas. And so this lands at a very interesting time and the party splits on the trigger. Bill question are interesting.

Republicans are more split than one, might think a majority 57% support banning all abortions in the scenario of the question. But a third oppose a blanket ban 34%. And you see that in the party breakdowns on the item that Darren was talking about, where Republicans tend to settle as a plurality. I think in most of those results is in limited circumstances, rape incest or to the woman’s life.

Um, and then another 10% say they don’t know. And so Democrats are not surprisingly much more unified, 80% are opposed to a ban. Now, as we transition into talking about the election, independence, I think are very interesting here. 26 support the ban 57% say they’re opposed now. That’s a pretty interesting position for independence in a campaign, particularly the gubernatorial campaign up to this point where a lot of the issues at the center of the campaign and they’re at the center because they’re being promoted there, but also.

Conditions that is the economy, the Biden administration, border security on all those issues, independent patterns among of attitudes among independents, look a lot more like Republicans than they do Democrats abortion. Very different. So the question does your, I think, you know, right in this moment is how much of an impact do we think this has in a gubernatorial election?

And we’ll just throw in there now. We had, you know, we did a trial ballot for O’Rourke and Abbott had Abbott up by 11 with, I think, somewhere in the range of what? About 20%, 25 undecided, not maybe not 16, 16, so a little less than 20. So Darren, how does this, how does the center of the camp. Well, I have a, a fair question.

Of course we can. Well, of course we can. Yeah, that won’t stop us from talking for 15 minutes on the subject of my democratic colleague. Um, Chris Anderson, who pulls a beacon research, had, uh, a quote, it said, it’s this essentially throwing a hand grenade into the middle of an old. Tumultuous political environment.

I agree with that. Although I would say right now, the Democrats probably need a hand grenade thrown into this tumultuous environment. So if you look at the issue profile that that exists right now, um, where voters are concerned about the economy, especially inflation at higher prices, they’re concerned about crime.

They’re concerned about immigration and border security. Um, you know, they’re concerned about the pandemic, um, mask mandates about, uh, public school curriculum. At best the Democrats break, even on say handling the pandemic, some ask mandate questions. Um, they’re on the wrong side of almost all of those other issues and wrong studies, simply in terms of public opinion, not, there’s not a policy judgment on my part.

We don’t do that. Um,

um, and in a state like Texas, Just problematic, which is that, that skew that exists nationally kind of favoring Republicans on these issues is more pronounced in Texas. And we’ll get to some of the particulars here in the ratings in a minute. So I guess the, the summary thing is it can’t possibly hurt them in the state of Texas in 2022.

Obviously the question is, does it help them into, you know, the law in terms of fundraising in terms of generating turnout? I think it’s probably gonna be. Um, I think that stuff may have happened anyway, in Texas, late in the game, this probably accelerates things. It may expand the electric a little bit.

Is it the kind of wedge issue that Democrats could use to actually win? Let’s say some of these Southern districts. Pretty competitive right now. Um, is it something that O’Rourke can use, um, to leverage some extra votes against Abbott? I I’m a little dubious, just because of the complexity of how the issue plays in Texas.

You know, for instance, I don’t have a clue how abortion plays in some of these Southern districts that are where, you know, the question is sort of the Latino vote and isn’t really moving in a particular way. I don’t pretend to know. And so it just makes it really complicated and that’s why we pay attention to why we watch.

No real clues in here that help us nail that down. Right. I mean, those are my feet. Yeah. Well, that’s, you know what I mean? It seems to me, you know, you can break that you kind of break it down into two things you’re talking about. Does it change the composition of the electorate? Right. You know, and does it, does it move any votes?

Right. Right. And I, you know, We’ve been talking a lot in this podcast and you know, and everyone else in the world about the power of negative partisanship and negative party identification. It’s a real question about whether abortion and that, where there a board, you know, this actually Dick, you know, challenges that are all at all.

And then there is this question of the independence, but I, you know, I’ve given up on trying to predict what independents are going to do. Just you are, you are. Well, I also, I mean, two things, so let me say what they are. So I remember to do it, you know, one, you know, one serve, you know, thinking about the effects this is going to have, I mean, at one I think, you know, even looking ahead to the election is almost a little too far.

I mean, one of the things that strikes me in all of this, as you know, we’ve been looking at these abortion attitudes for a long time now it’s sort of like, I realized how old I’m getting when I say things. And I realized that doesn’t make me uncomfortable to say, like, I’ve been doing that for this law.

You know, it’s like, it’s been awhile. As guy, I, now I’m looking at Darren going to this guy, these guys are, I shouldn’t say I’m much, much, much younger than both Darren and Jim, just in case you just want to now. Um, so you’ve been looking at this, I’ve been looking at for a long time. And part of what’s amazing about it in some ways is that, you know, abortion attitudes are so, are so sticky.

They’re so fixed. It’s because you know, people know what they think about abortion. It’s not so. Policy topic. And a lot of times they have a lot of sort of reinforcing views on the topic. Right. And so we just don’t see a lot of movement. It’s not like, you know, Texas passes a law and then all of a sudden you see a big jump in opinion.

But what I would say is like, this has all happened under a Roe V. Wade frame. Right. In which there were some sort of subset, you know, when we’re really talking about what, if we move the guard rail over five feet, not like, what if we just get rid of that? Right. Or what if we, you know, and so one of the things I’m kind of looking for the next step before, I can really answer that question about the election piece of this number one is.

Does this create a seismic shift? Because the underlying context in which people’s abortion attitudes exist is about to fundamentally change. So that’s, I think the first thing we kind of need to answer kind of going into the summer. Once we get a real opinion, this is still a very insider story, man. I know it’s like cover the news, like crazy, but like when Politico drops it, like you got to remember guys like political, political split.

So let’s just like, you know, Yeah. So I’m thinking, you know what? I want to see what happens, but then too, I mean, the point, so the Hispanic thing is the other point. So I think with that, one of the things that sort of strikes me is you’re right. We can’t know exactly what Hispanics are thinking in the border, but we can certainly, you know, in the border region, south, Texas is increasingly competitive, but you know, when we look at the distribution of like opinions among Hispanics on the abortion issue, Terribly different than the distribution of pain we see on most issues in which there’s clear partisan sides.

Yeah. Right. You know, Democrats are looking to be at about the 60% mark, maybe a little below Republicans are at about 30 to 35%. Depends. Right. And that’s why we look at this as you, which makes me think, you know, again, it’s like the usual thing. If we’re talking about Hispanics in south Texas, that Democrat, you know, the few competitive seats, I don’t think this is good for them.

Because those, I think those, I think those are probably the more conservative, you know, Hispanics, because they’re mostly not because they’re like some superior, they live in a rural part of the state. This is not, you know, some, you know, 29 year old college educated, Hispanic who just moved from Laredo to a suburb of Houston who the Democrats are trying to mobilize.

I think that person falls on the other side on the abortion issue. So I, I don’t, you know, I think it probably doesn’t help Democrats down south, but I agree with you otherwise when the economy. Numbers are so bad when the immigration, uh, issue is not going anywhere. And there’s no trust with Democrats to deal with it, to talk about anything else is gotta be good, at least in the short run.

Yeah. There’s two quick observations. The, you know, we keep talking about suburban women, especially suburban white women. And just again, putting on our strategists hats here, there is a part of me that wonders. Is this a way that Democrats might be able to leverage. Some of the momentum that they have.

Largely built around opposition or skepticism towards Trump in suburban Dallas and suburban Houston in those places. Um, the second observation is broader and that is that the one way the Democrats get more competitive, an environment like this is, is to Jim’s point about kind of partisan effect is if the Republicans are branded as extremists as out of touch.

Right. And that, that to me is so does abortion itself matter? I mean, I, I always look for an issue as. A leverage point by which a broader claim about the election is made. And that’s where this possibly comes into play. And frankly, O’Rourke has done a decent job of positioning himself as, you know, an outsider running against, uh, a corrupt out of touch Republican establishment, which, you know, I say it sort of sarcastically, but it, it politically, it’s smart in a state like Texas.

One of the few ways that I think a Democrat can frame an election successfully, and it raises the question that we’ve been asking for the last, you know, w you know, almost a year. Which is, you know, is the forceful turn to the right by the legislature and governor Abbott that really started to really bear fruit about a year ago in the legislative session.

You know, it didn’t go too far. This really does raise that question and, and it raises it not just for democratic voters, but I mean, governor Abbott was pretty quiet about this yesterday. I mean, you know, there was a certain amount of, you know, w Josh and I were talking about this. Too glib in this, but I’m going to say it anyway.

Certain amount of dog catches car here. When Republicans get to stand up and go, Hey, look, we overturned Roe V. Wade, and they look behind him and there’s not really a parade. And now I think your ride down and it’s a very crowded issue environment out there right now. And particularly in Texas, do the Democrats have the capacity to use this in a law as a lever in the way that you’re talking about?

It’s an open question. I know. Well, see, this is I, yeah. I, I totally agree with Darren on that. I think that that’s what sort of interest, I mean, to your thing, you know how, you know, how far is too far, this discussion we’ve repeatedly had. I mean, if you, I think on its own, the answer is. It’s fine. And part of it is just because the majority of the majority party’s voters tend to either actively or tacitly agree with a lot of these things, even if there is some minority opposition and that minority opposition within the party is not about to go vote for Beto O’Rourke right.

Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, anybody else you can think of? It just doesn’t matter. Right. But I think the thing here is, is they don’t, and we’ll probably transition to this now, but like, In a state in which, you know, the economic numbers are trending in the wrong direction and look historically bad.

I’m talking about in public opinion, right. And, uh, you know, in a state of Michigan Republicans own the keys to the car, they own the car. They’ve been driving it for years. I think that’s the point, what you say, Hey, look, everybody’s got a problem getting housing. They’ve, you know, they’re looking at their paycheck and they’re saying, you know, I can’t afford anything.

And. Now that extremism looks a little bit more costly. And so to the extent that it can be mobilized, you know, I think by Democrats and to serve more of a discussion about like, look, there are serious problems, Texas are trying to face, and instead, this is what they’re doing. I think this is a very salient example of, of, of a, of a topic that can be used to mobilize that otherwise all of these topics are individual.

I always point out as like, you know, I’m gonna say, you know, a lot of people been asking. I was like, well, is this going to change? Like the way voters think about the election? It’s like, well, look not at the economy. Right right now, you know, not, not if there’s 50,000 migrants, you know, coming to the border, you know, every week, like the, no, but it could be part of something else.

The question is, you know, can you do it? And I’ll also say, you know, the electric rarely, uh, rewards nuance, and we’re a Rourke is going to want to find himself. If he’s going to talk about this issue, a lot is going to be in a pretty nuanced place is going to be hard to stay in effectively. Well, and you know, you mentioned the, you know, the overwhelming sense of the, of, you know, The dour sense of the economy.

We’re all talking about the poor we went on. I mean, there are a lot of really striking results on this, in this poll. I mean, Darren, you were saying you noticed the growth thing. I I’ve been preoccupied with that. I mean, but you know, we’ve asked this before, but this time we, you know, we asked again, if sections thought that the population growth in the state over the last several years was good or bad for them.

And, you know, the vast majority, you know, we scream this by saying, have you heard much about it? Most people said they heard at least something about it. And the results were among the most interested in the poll. Only 34% thought population growth had been good for the state. 40% thought it had been bad and more than a quarter didn’t commit.

Um, and this comes as the wrong track number in Texas nudged up again to just over 50%. The second time in the last year, last time was in August when things were really, really terrible, just generally, but also the first two times at over a decade of polling. Yeah. And right. And 43% of the Texas economy is worse off than it was a year ago.

Right. So. Also add to this, you know, asked about their personal economic situation compare to last year, 43% said they’re worse off. This is the most saying that they, they are worse off compared to last year in the entire time series, going back to October, 2008 that’s so we had 43 twice. So we’ve actually hit this two other times and it wasn’t.

Wake of the financial last financial crisis. So this is how sort of unusual this is in terms of these it’s kind of does go back to the positional position. You know, where the position of the Abbott administration vis-a-vis, it’s our Greg Abbott as a candidate. Vis-a-vis the voters in the state. I mean, the obvious.

Play on this is to blame all of this on the byte administration and the Democrats, because they are running the federal government they’re running in because we know that voters tend to blame hold the president responsible for this. Right. But I mean, I guess when, you know, you’re getting these responses at the kind of state level, I mean, I, you know, is this a vulnerability, Darren?

I mean, I, you know, the economic numbers are fascinating. I, in the previous economic crisis, For our purposes being oh, 8 0 9. Yeah. You know, you had a bottoming out and then a sort of a gradual recovery, um, in, in polling terms, the percentage of people who said they were worse off, or the country was worse off just kind of slowly climbed up in oh nine one.

Oh, et cetera. And I was expecting a similar pattern now, which is a cratering, uh, in the immediate aftermath of the pandemic and the shutdown of the economy. Um, but what you’ve seen is that, let me just read a few numbers over the last, I guess it’s eight polls that we’ve conducted. So the boundary of this is like October 20, 20 before the last election.

And what I’m giving you here is the net negative on people saying that their family is worse off. So it was minus 11, was the October, 2020 number worse, often better off minus six, minus two minus. Minus 11 minus 13, minus 17, minus 26. And the most recent poll. Yeah. So it ain’t getting better. Um, it’s getting worse.

Um, right now within this Texas electric, all of that is coming down heavily on Joe Biden. Um, which is if you take the first four polls we did after he was inaugurated, his average approved disapprove was. Now part of that’s because there was a single pole where he was up 11 points. Um, if you take the last three poles he’s minus 17.

So he’s gone from roughly 50% approval to about 36% approval on average, across the last four poles. So it’s all coming down on his head. His approval is worse in the issue areas on the economy and on immigration and border security. Exactly. Yeah. He’s and there’s almost no variants until you get, in other words, Biden’s specific issue ratings.

33% approval on every one of these sort of bad issues, inflation, immigration, crime, et cetera. They tick up on Corona virus, but in the Texas poll only to, yeah, it’s the contrast between Biden’s numbers handling the pandemic in Texas versus nationally are really interesting. Right? That’s his best issue now it’s his best issue in Texas, but it only gets him to blink three years.

Yeah, exactly, exactly. So, so right now, It’s all being absorbed by the Biden administration. Um, is it possible that the Democrats can focus that fire on specific issues and problems in Texas? Well, of course, what Abbott and the Republicans are doing is, is focusing the fire on, uh, Biden policies that make it difficult for T so in other words, there’s this interesting link between, um, the border crisis and immigration, which I think is.

Uh, this is odd. It’s a little bit of a bank shot, but I think it’s sort of insulating, um, the existing Texas establishment, the ruling class, the Republicans, basically from a lot of firewood is the ruling class of Texas. Yeah, I did. I did. Sorry about that now my favorite bug. Right. But it is, it’s kind of interesting, right.

That, um, you know, the focus on these other issues, like, okay, so what’s the narrative Republicans are offering all these people are coming into this. Some of them, undocumented workers vote for crazy places like California, and they’re making it much harder and they’re changing the economic landscape in Texas.

And so I think that’s manifest in the, the is the growth good, but it’s also interesting in that population growth question, we could go, you know, we could do a whole podcast on this that, you know, every time I think I’ve got my head around it, I look at some of the other, I look at some of the tabs or I look at some of the inputs and you know, there’s a lot of.

Things going on. I mean, like on one hand population growth, people are saying it’s bad for the state, but the place where people are really moving. Which is to the urban and suburban areas are not where the wings are worse. The readings are worse than the rural areas, right? They’re most negative in the rural areas.

So there’s some other thing, there’s, this is a composite of something that we’ve kind of, I mean, but you know, I mean, it’s interesting, you know, there’s things about you always have exogenous shocks and you think about the fact the electorate is facing just a series of shocks. And it depends, you know, it’s not saying that everybody, but, you know, for Democrats, Donald Trump was a shock, right?

If you want to go back and this is just being. The shocks and it’s, what’s interesting is, I mean, you can, we’ve been doing this for so long. You know, you go back to the last financial crisis and you looked at sort of the sort of housing bubble and what you saw was Texas will remain bullish on taxes through that whole thing.

I can say it’s the Texas miracle, whatever there’s all these reasons of Texas was a little bit insulate for some of that stuff. But the recovery. You know, Texas attitudes towards Texas was fast and it wasn’t even that deep. Right. Uh, and then as we’ve gone on, and we’ve talked about this before, you know, to the extent that like, you know, partisanship increasingly, uh, conditions, people’s economic views.

So you look at, you know, again, that if we talked to this where you look at the tier of Azure’s national economy, if you know, when Republicans were in charge of Democrats, that it was bad Republican, that was good. Second Democrat takes off it flips. Now Republicans say the economy is. Democrats say it’s good.

Right? So the certain that going on, this is breaking all of that. I mean, right now, to the extent that you see, you know, I think you and I talked about this, it actually sort of shows that there are limitations on partisan perceptions. There’s some things out in the world. Punch you in the face, whether you’re a Democrat or Republican.

So then the question becomes, you know, how, how, you know, how well, I mean, I think, look, it doesn’t change the fact, you know, if you’re sitting here listening, like, oh, so the Democrats have a chance, which is the question I get all the time. Right? It’s like, yeah. I don’t think this really changes the underlying fundamentals.

It just comes down to, you know, is Abbott able to, as you know, Darren salmon, I think he’s doing a really good job of making sure that the guy who’s been in office for less than two years owns the entire economy of Texas. When the guy has been in office for, you know, eight and running. It’s just like, well, it’s his fault.

I think he’s got again, he’s got a lot of reasons that that should work. I think just in terms of the nature of politics, nature, partisanship, the way that I think, you know, midterm elections look in a bad economy, all that stuff. But to say that there’s not a vulnerability there looking at this date and especially if it continues to go in that direction, I, you know, I think that would be overstating it.

And we should also say that though, those track numbers have been very well. Yeah, they’re moving up and down because there’s a lot in the period. Yeah. And just a lot of inputs. That’s the thing, because the track numbers are moving because it’s like, well, are we responding to like, you know, COVID, are we responding to like the fact that we’re out of COVID or that we’re back in COVID-19 it’s like, well, what about inflation?

And it’s just like my kid’s school, this fights at my kid’s school. Yeah, exactly. There are a couple of really interesting pieces. Or listeners too on this one is, uh, the work of Kathy Cramer on rural resentment, which I think of continually in Texas. So, I mean, you guys are right that the, the movement is largely coming, especially to places like Dallas and Austin and in Houston.

But I think that actually fuels rural resentment even further, which is look at what’s happening. These, these crazy Californians are moving into these cities and, and the feeling of rural resentment is the. You know, a disproportionate amount of attention and energy and resources go to the cities at the expense of these rural areas.

I think that’s only increased, which is evident in the, in the opinion, housing prices and housing prices. Yeah, exactly. And then the, the second kind of large piece was in the Atlantic recently under the heading. I don’t remember the author, but it was, um, you know, why are people, um, why do people think are so angry about the economy?

At first? I thought it was a completely clueless question, but it was. Why are people why people are so angry about the economy and it pointed out that inflation is different than unemployment, unemployment effects directly eight, 12%. You could take it up to 25. You’re talking about people, fear losing their job, or know somebody who lost her job.

Inflation affects. And, and so the, it will be interesting as Josh suggested. I don’t think we’ve had this kind of inflation in Texas. We’ve had gas price fluctuation since the early 1980s soar models about the relationship between the economy and politics are, are instructive, but maybe not dispositive.

And there were a lot of. You know, I was saying this to Josh and, and another one of our younger colleagues when the inflation thing really started becoming a public issue. And we started seeing it, you know, I mean, you and I are just barely old enough to remember the last time there was real inflation and it was a real issue for most people.

It’s not only they’re feeling it, but it’s also something they’ve never felt before they’ve never experienced. So I just had it. It’s also exacerbated by the fact that other people, you know, pointed this out is. Wages real wages have gone, had been going down for a long, long time. Right. And that’s something that people don’t notice on like a weekly trip to the grocery store.

But I think this is where, again, some of this disruption. Yeah, it gets, I mean, it’s Darren’s man. I think this is how this disruption gets expanded so much further. If you think about the things you could link into this, you know, you get like some Amazon workers are unionizing all of a sudden, right. And all these things that are going on.

It’s like, because there’s a lot of stuff going on and I’ll just point out. One question we asked was whether people favored, uh, increasing the federal minimum wage. A few different times. We find techs about 65% of people support raising the minimum wage. This is pretty consistent, actually what we found over time.

The only interesting thing is that again, talking about disruption, a majority of Republicans have opposed it in each of the polls. We asked previously until this time, this time a plurality of Republicans and it was 47 40 supported raising the minimum wage. Which shows that would have anything to do.

This shows you there’s something going on here. Some of the fundamentals are beginning to shift a little bit. So, so before we run out of time, I want to go to, you know, to each of us, um, you know, pick something out. We haven’t talked about that you thought was interesting in the poll or that really struck you let’s start with you, Darren.

Yeah, I think, uh, we, we always ask the, uh, outside of the poll, what’s the most important problem facing the country. What’s the most important problem facing the state of Texas? I was struck by the juxtaposition of those results is time. And the, the question about what’s the most important problem facing the country, uh, unemployment and unemployment, sorry, the economy and inflation slash rising prices.

Number one 28%, um, immigration border security, 10%. So an 18 point difference. So a lot of talk on Republican leaning news organizations, foxes. This law talks about immigration border security. It’s important, but it’s dwarfed by the. In the state of Texas, these numbers are almost reversed. 34% say immigration border security is the number one issue facing the state.

Uh, the combined inflation economy, numbers are 14% really striking. And I think speaks to the, the point that Josh and Jim had been made making about what a difficult issue environment it is for the Democrats, which is, you know, if you’re, if you’re begging to move the focus away from, uh, you know, immigration to the economy, uh, That’s a tough issue environment for Democrats.

Yeah. That’s I think that’s a good way. That’s a good use of those, those numbers. How about you judge? Well, you know, there’s, there’s, there’s so much on this pole and we’ve only barely scratched the surface. We did a lot of stuff on, you know, the, the situation Ukraine. We did some on immigration. We did, uh, a number of questions on, you know, discrimination and perceptions of discrimination in society, and some new questions about trans people’s attitudes towards transgender.

Uh, Uh, people education and so on and so forth, you know, I’ll just, I guess, let’s see. What should I point out here? There’s so many choices I think I’ll go to, I think I’ll go to the immigration is we can talk about it and it is like the big, one of the big issues here. You know, I think one thing that’s sort of important to point out here is that, you know, immigration attitudes in Texas are pretty, you know, they’re, they’re, they’re a, an elephant in the room, I think around anything that we talk about.

Um, You know, and, and I think, you know, what we find is that this is a very, obviously an incredibly complicated issue, but we, we send us see that, you know, not so much in the public opinion landscape, at least among, you know, again, the ruling party is Darren calls it, right? So we asked, you know, how do we does the U S allow too much, you know, legal immigration, too many people, too few the right amount, you know, 61% of Republicans say to.

Right. Uh, whether or not we should accept, uh, you know, refugees from south and central America, 64% of Republicans said we should not, uh, not as a little bit different in terms of Ukrainian refugees. I’ll leave that for another time. 83% support, the immediate deportation of undocumented immigrants, uh, 54.

Yeah, 51% support, uh, increasing border security saying they say, we’re saying too little on border security, even though we keep spending more and more and more. And so, you know, when you think, I think to some people they’re sort of extended. I mean, going back to this well, how much is too much everything.

Well, there’s really no indication that there’s any limit to what would be too much when it comes to dealing with the border situation and taxes, especially among Republican voters. If you think about what’s driving Greg Abbott strategy around a lot of that, you need to look at these numbers because.

You know, he is speaking really to the core of his constituency with most of what he’s doing. Yeah. I mean, I was going to flag the policy side of that on border security, really. And just say, you know, among voters who say, they’ve heard at least a little about, we didn’t want to use the term operation lone star, but who have heard about the stage where we call the state’s deployment of police and military on the board.

To paraphrase 57% still support that. Yeah. Right. Only 31% oppose it, you know, near unanimous support, 90% among Republicans. Um, but also, you know, going back to the point about independence and abortion, a plurality of independence also support this policy. Very good policy for, for, for the governor. And thus far, we’re not seeing much negative response to the increase in spending.

And I’m, again, I’m like a broken record on this, but I mean, it’s, to me, it’s just stunning. If you count the extra 500 million. Transferred from other agencies in the state to border security last week. We’re now at about $4 billion. That means that in one biennium, we have roughly two, we’ll be generous and say tripled, but we’ve actually closer to quadrupled the expenditures out of the state budget on border security.

And I’ve been talking to groups, you know, in the usual on the circuit, the law, you know, and I be, I, you know, open offer. Can anybody. Point me to a budget increase of that magnitude in one budget cycle in Texas ever. I’ve had no takers thus far. And that’s just, you know, I mean, you know, it speaks to, you know, the political value of this issue, as you were kind of saying.

Um, but it’s really kind of, you know, amazing. And we had a little bit of an increase this time, at least from the last poll on, you know, the question about is the state spending. When we ask is a space sending too much, right amount, too little on border security. The too much went to 30, which is as high as it’s been, but still just at the outer edge it’s been roughly between.

You know, 15% the very first time we asked that, but that was in 2019. It’s fluctuated between 15 and 30, but mostly between about 24 and 30. So it’s not like there’s been a big sea change. I haven’t looked at the tabs that closely. I suspect it’s just a movement, even more Democrats. If people are taking partisan queuing with all the coverage, I mean, the D.

The other counter responsive, the governor talking about border security as frequently as he can. And, you know, experimenting with new policies is that this is much more. You know, in the, in the public eye, triggering more criticism and probably triggering more potters and responses, as long as 90% of Republicans say, it’s fine.

Okay. Well, and then I say, yeah, and then what are you use better? We’re going to say, no, I actually want to leg. I want to de-commit our resources from the border. Yeah. I mean, that’s not going to work, right. I mean, that’s, yeah. That’s not going to happen certainly between now and January, but, but that dollar figure, I mean, I, yeah.

Is that population times inflation? I don’t, I mean, it’s pretty, I mean, it’s, it’s pretty amazing. It’s a lot, you know, it is. Okay. Um, well, this has been fun. I said, we’d go over a little bit. We went over some, um, but I want to thank Darren and Josh for being here. Very fun. This is always one of the funner things we do.

I should flag that, you know, without getting into too many deals, Ross Ramsey retired last week from the Texas Tribune. And I sent Ross a note this morning. You know, it’s very strange to be rolling out a pole without you being involved in it one way or the other, you know? So, um, I want to flag that for Ross, but we’ve had a good time happy retirement rose.

Thanks to you guys. Yeah. Price. Ain’t listening to this stuff anymore. Just kidding. Ross is also okay. Yes. So thanks to you guys. Thanks to our excellent crew here in the audio studio in the liberal arts development studio at the university of Texas at Austin, uh, there are tons and tons and tons of results.

Downloadable files. Um, I mean, literally hundreds of graphics, if not thousands, thousands of Easter eggs, everywhere. Easter eggs. Yeah. It is. It’s like, yeah, Easter 24 7 this week on this poll that you can find all of those results and, and all the documentation and material@texaspoliticsdotutexas.edu. You can go to the blog page or to the latest poll page to find all that kind of material and much, much more.

Thanks for listening. We’ll be back next week with another second reading podcast.

The second reading podcast is a production of the Texas politics project at the university of Texas at Austin. .