Photo illustration: ABC News/Getty Images
Welcome to Polapalooza. This is the weekly voting summary.
It’s officially impeachment season again. On Tuesday, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy announced that he would direct three House committees to launch investigations into whether President Biden profited from his son Hunter’s overseas business dealings. McCarthy accused the Biden family of a “culture of corruption,” lied that the Biden administration gave Hunter “special treatment” in tax and gun criminal investigations, and that Biden himself knew about his son’s financial dealings. He said he was following.
The good news for Mr. McCarthy and those on the right who support the impeachment inquiry is that Americans generally seem to believe that Hunter Biden’s business dealings were sketchy at best and illegal at worst.
But Hunter Biden is not the subject of the impeachment inquiry, his father is. Republicans have so far offered no concrete evidence linking the president to his son’s overseas businesses, but the impeachment inquiry could give House Republicans access to bank records and other financial documents from Biden and his son. There is a possibility that it will happen. Republicans are now the most convinced that Biden was involved in Hunter’s wrongdoing, but Americans overall are less likely to believe that former President Donald Trump’s family is corrupt than the Biden family. strong. There is also no broad consensus that an impeachment inquiry is warranted, suggesting that Republicans will need to do some convincing if they want the public to support an impeachment inquiry.
Americans think Hunter Biden benefited from his fatherhood
All allegations of widespread corruption within the Biden family have yet to be proven. But what is less controversial is the fact that Hunter Biden has personally made significant profits through foreign business dealings and is the subject of a long-running criminal investigation. Earlier this summer, he agreed to plead guilty to two misdemeanor counts of failing to pay taxes on millions of dollars in income in 2017 and 2018, avoiding conviction on separate illegal gun possession charges. She had included a potential additional agreement, but the plea deal fell apart after she refused to allow a judge appointed by President Trump to “rubber stamp” the agreement. She claimed it was not standard. Republicans have accused the Biden administration of giving Hunter a “sweetheart” deal, and in August, Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed a special counsel to continue investigating Hunter Biden’s finances.
None of this bodes well for the president’s son, and recent polls show Americans are dissatisfied with Hunter Biden’s actions. After the plea deal collapsed, a YouGov/Economist poll in August found that 72% of Americans, including a slim majority (53%) of Democrats, said they wanted Hunter Biden to hold a position in his father’s government. It turned out that he believed he had personally benefited from it. The same poll found that two-thirds (66 percent) of Americans have a negative view of Hunter Biden, while only 17 percent have a favorable view. (another 17 percent said they didn’t know). According to a Yahoo News poll conducted by YouGov in August, 59% of Americans believe Hunter Biden used his last name and proximity to power to obtain millions of dollars from foreign business associates. I think I put it in. The same poll found that 51 percent of Americans believe Hunter Biden fraudulently claimed tens of thousands of dollars in tax credits. Similarly, an Ipsos/Politico poll conducted in August found that 59% of Americans, including 51% of Democrats, believe Hunter Biden is guilty of criminal charges in the tax delinquency case. It turned out that Notably, only 2 percent of respondents said they believed he was innocent, and 38 percent said they did not know.
But the YouGov/Economist poll suggests that Americans think most presidents’ children receive some degree of special treatment. According to the survey, 84% of respondents think the children of U.S. presidents do things that others don’t do because of their parents’ jobs, and a similar proportion (85%) believe children say they personally benefit from their parents’ positions in government, at least sometimes. So Americans generally seem convinced that Hunter Biden benefited financially from his father’s work, and even a slim majority of Democrats believe he likely committed a crime. Although I think this behavior may not be shocking or unexpected.
Republicans are convinced Biden is involved in Hunter’s wrongdoing
Republicans don’t need to convince the American people that Hunter Biden deserves an investigation or even a criminal trial. But that’s not the point in impeaching the father. To justify impeaching a president, Republicans would need to prove that the president engaged in financial fraud or corruption that rises to the level of an impeachable crime. And so far, Republicans have been making claims without supporting facts. When McCarthy announced the investigation, he said millions of dollars Hunter Biden made in overseas transactions were also improperly shared with Biden’s family, and that Biden used his official role as vice president to obtain business for Hunter. He claimed, without evidence, that he had supported the
Of course, further findings could emerge linking Biden and his family to Hunter Biden’s business dealings. But for now, Americans have not fully accepted the idea that the Biden family is involved in a plan to spread broader influence. In a Yahoo poll, fewer than half (41%) say they believe Hunter Biden funneled millions of dollars to his father in a long-term scheme to help Joe Biden profit from his position. ), 26% said they did not believe it and 33% said they did not know. A similar proportion (44%) believe Biden definitely or probably did something illegal regarding Hunter Biden, while 32% believe he definitely or probably did not I said I don’t know.
Many Americans aren’t too concerned about the allegations against the Bidens, which is probably why so many people say “I don’t know” to these questions. Another recent poll found that even if Joe Biden hadn’t done anything illegal, a slightly higher percentage of people said he may have acted unethically. An SSRS/CNN poll conducted in August found that 61% of Americans agreed that Mr. Biden had at least some involvement in Hunter Biden’s business dealings, but did not agree that Mr. Less than half (42%) said they had done so, and 18% said they had committed some unethical acts but not others. illegally. Similarly, a Quinnipiac University poll conducted in September found that 35% of Americans believe Biden was involved in Hunter Biden’s business dealings with Ukraine and China and believed he did something illegal. while 14% believe Biden did something unethical but not illegal. Percent believes he was not involved.
Republicans most convinced of wrongdoing by Biden family
Percentage of respondents who say they believe Hunter Biden did the following, by party affiliation
All Democrats Republicans Independents Used family name and proximity to power to obtain millions of dollars from foreign business partners 59 37 88 63 Missed tax filing deadlines 59 50 78 57 Tens of thousands of dollars in taxes Fraudulently claimed deductions 51 31 81 51 Received preferential treatment from federal prosecutors when entering into plea bargain 51 22 86 56 Joe Biden funneled millions of dollars to his father in a long-running scheme to help him use his position to profit 41 10 84 41
Source: YouGov/Yahoo News
But as the table above shows, it’s Republicans who really believe the Biden family is corrupt. Unsurprisingly, Democrats are less convinced that the president did anything wrong, and independents are also quite divided. Of course, more publicity about the allegations motivating the impeachment inquiry, and the concrete evidence that may be uncovered during the process, will change people’s minds, or at least change some of those who are undecided. There is a possibility that it can be persuaded.
And notably, a Yahoo News poll found that while the percentage of Americans (including the percentage of Democrats) who think Hunter Biden did something illegal has increased since last fall, Joe Biden It turns out that the proportion of respondents who believe that the law has been broken remains functionally unchanged. Despite resounding Republican accusations to the contrary. A poll by Fox News’ Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research found similar trends. The percentage of Americans who think Hunter Biden did something illegal rose from 39 percent in December to 50 percent in August, but fewer Americans think Joe Biden did something illegal. , Mr. Biden committed illegal acts in connection with his son’s business dealings, but nothing was actually done. (According to the survey, it was 38 percent in August, compared to 35 percent in December.)
Americans are not convinced that impeachment is justified.
Perhaps most worryingly for Republicans, most Americans do not believe an impeachment inquiry against Biden is warranted at this time. A poll conducted by GBAO/Fabrizio Lee & Associates for the Wall Street Journal in late August found that 52 percent of Americans oppose impeaching Biden, while only 41 percent approve. It turned out to be. Most recently, a YouGov poll conducted on September 13th found that 41 percent of Americans oppose impeaching Biden, 44 percent support it, and 15 percent are unsure. According to our poll tracker, Americans were even more divided in early October 2019, when President Trump’s first impeachment began. Following the January 6th attack on the US Capitol, a majority of Americans supported the impeachment of Trump. A small majority of Americans consistently supported even removing President Trump from office before his term ends.
In fact, corruption allegations are more troubling for the Trump family than for the Biden family. According to a Yahoo News poll, 46% of Americans think Trump and his family are more corrupt than the Biden family, and 36% think the Biden family is more corrupt than the Trump family. And a recent AP-NORC poll found that Americans are more likely to describe Trump as “corrupt” than Biden. Meanwhile, a September YouGov poll found that Americans believe the impeachment inquiry is more politically motivated to embarrass Biden (41%) than a serious effort to uncover the truth (28%). It turned out that there is a high possibility of explanation.
That doesn’t mean Hunter Biden’s legal troubles aren’t Biden’s fault, especially since a grand jury just indicted him on federal firearms charges. According to a recent Emerson College poll, 47% of voters say the charges against Trump have made them less likely to vote for him in the presidential election, while 46% say Hunter Biden’s taxes and gun felonies have made them less likely to vote for him in the presidential election. They say they are less likely to vote for Joe Biden in 2024. So as Hunter Biden’s investigation continues to unfold, his father could suffer political damage. But at this point, Republicans are not only overlooking evidence that Biden is implicated in his son’s misconduct in ways that could merit impeachment, they are also failing to get the public on their side.
Other poll bytes:
Biden approval
According to FiveThirtyEight’s Presidential Approval Tracker, 40.9% of Americans approve of Biden’s job as president, while 54.4% disapprove (-13.5 points net approval rating). At this time last week, the approval rating was 40.0% and the disapproval rating was 56.0% (net approval rating -16.0 points). A month ago, Biden’s approval rating was 40.8% and his disapproval rating was 54.5%, for a net approval rating of -13.8 points.
Correction (September 18, 2023, 11:20 a.m.): An earlier version of this article said House Speaker Kevin McCarthy provided evidence that Hunter Biden shared some of the funds he received through overseas deals with his family. He said he made the claim without any explanation. In fact, there is evidence that Hunter Biden’s family also received money through these transactions, but McCarthy offered no evidence in his announcement that they were illegal or corrupt.
