The Archive

PRESENTED BY

BY JOHN BRESNAHAN, ANNA PALMER AND JAKE SHERMAN
WITH MAX COHEN AND CHRISTIAN HALL

Happy Wednesday, and welcome to The Canvass’ “Year in Review.”

The Canvass is a project we are incredibly excited about here at Punchbowl News. It is our exclusive monthly anonymous tracking poll of senior Capitol Hill aides. Some of the senior-most staffers on the Hill give us their unvarnished view each month on what they are advising their bosses, what they are hearing behind the scenes and what they believe will happen next. And then we are able to share that information with you, Punchbowl News’ readers. 

Aides are truly some of the most powerful but least understood figures in Washington, and The Canvass seeks to peel back the curtain on their views in real time.

We are also able to track shifts in public opinion on the Hill, and see trends as they are beginning to form. We thought it would be useful to look back on how sentiment among senior staff has changed or shifted over the past 10 months. A big thank you to Locust Street Group, our polling partner on this project.

The Canvass is truly unique in the marketplace because we are able to reach into the highest levels of the staff ranks and track opinion and public sentiment. We have 245 Republicans and 201 Democrats signed up and participating.

Here are five of our top takeaways that we noticed this year:

So dig in. We’re excited to grow this product, watch it continue to evolve and help us and you track public opinion on Capitol Hill.  If you’re a senior staffer and want to participate in the Canvass, sign up here, there is a lot more coming in 2022. Here is the full presentation from the Locust Street Group.

Check out Locust Street Group’s Phillip Morris, breaking down the top trends from the Canvass:

THE LEADERSHIP

We at Punchbowl News spend a lot of time and a tremendous amount of energy reporting on the leadership on Capitol Hill. In our view, the four leaders — Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy — are the center of the legislative universe and the most powerful people in Washington.

But truth be told, it’s traditionally been difficult to judge what rank-and-file lawmakers and their aides think of the leadership.

We have some truly interesting data here.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi remains the most powerful leader on Capitol Hill by a mile. A whopping 60% of our Canvass participants believe she holds the most power and influence in D.C. That includes 74% of Democrats and 45% of Republicans. Of course, she is the leader of a narrow Democratic majority, but it’s comparatively large when you consider the 50-50 Senate. 

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy is widely viewed as having little influence in the broader Washington power structure. No surprise there. He leads a House minority that’s large but is mostly disengaged from day-to-day governing. We expect this will change quite quickly as we approach the 2022 midterm elections.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer gets abysmal marks from Democrats. Just 8% say he’s the most powerful and influential person in D.C. That’s stunningly low for a Senate majority leader, but again, he’s a majority leader of an evenly split Senate.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has 44% of Republicans thinking he is the most powerful. 11% of Democrats believe that, as well. In other words, McConnell is viewed as more powerful than Schumer.

This is where it gets interesting to us. 62% of Democrats want new leadership in D.C. regardless of the outcome of the 2022 elections. Democratic leaders, of course, have been in power for decades — Pelosi got into Democratic leadership nearly 20 years ago in 2002.

Let’s hear what our friends at the Locust Street Group have to say about this: “A majority of aides on both sides of the aisle say that their party may need to replace their leadership in 2023. In Capitol Hill time we’re a long way from this, but the unified and widespread sentiment on this topic tells us that this problem is likely here to stay.”

AROUND THE HILL

If you listen to conventional wisdom, both political parties are engaged in a rush to the political extremes on policy. The Build Back Better bill was relatively progressive in the House and House Republicans are clearly hewing much closer to Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) than Rep. John Katko (R-N.Y.).

But we have some evidence that there’s a desire for the parties to track closer to the moderates.

After the BBB and BIF negotiations, most staffers believe that both parties should follow moderates as we head into the 2022 midterms. This is a noticeable shift from just last month when a majority of Democratic House staffers said that the political strategy of progressives was more likely to help Democrats maintain their majorities. 

A majority of staffers — 61% — say they believe that the political strategy of moderates is more likely to help Democrats preserve their congressional majorities. 39% believe that progressives have the winning strategy. 

57% of Republican staffers told us that listening to moderates would help them win control of Congress, compared to 43% who said to follow the conservative wing of the party.

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THE LEGISLATION

We think this has been one of the most active years for legislating in more than a decade. Just this year alone, Congress has passed the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, the $1.2 trillion infrastructure law and now it is considering the $1.7 trillion Build Back Better Act. 

First, a point of pride: The Canvass consistently showed that infrastructure was likely to pass, even as public sentiment wavered. At its absolute lowest point, 69% of respondents said it would pass.

Here’s something else we found very interesting: a bunch of the individual provisions in the BBB are actually quite popular. This runs completely counter to public perception that the bill is a liberal wish list filled with nothing Republicans would ever consider. 

But here is a warning sign that should be of interest to our readers — especially at the top rung of the leadership: Just 20% of Republican staffers say they believe members of Congress have an obligation to lift the debt limit. 78% of GOP aides say members do not have an obligation to do so. At the same time, 100% of Democratic staffers say members have the responsibility to raise the borrowing cap. This will be a major pressure point in 2023 if Republicans take control of the House, Senate or both. Remember: in 2011 the debt limit, deficits and the budget were big flashpoints. We expect it will become so again in 2023 if the GOP grabs onto any of the levers of power. 

CONTROL OF CONGRESS

Next year — 2022 — will be all about the battle for control of Congress. House Republicans have the historical edge; the party out of power almost always wins a large number of seats. Republicans winning a House majority would lead to a massive shift in the Capitol, but also a big shift for President Joe Biden for the last two years of his first term. 

What’s surprising to us is just how many Democrats believe Republicans will win the House. 76% of Democratic aides say their party will lose control of the House. In April, 36% said the GOP would take the majority. That’s doubled in eight months.

The Senate is a bit different. Midterms in the House tend to be national contests, referendums on the party in power. In the Senate, each individual race is a multi-million dollar effort with two candidates navigating a bevy of state, local and national issues. Right now, a very slim majority — 52% — believe Republicans will take control of the chamber. 22% of Democrats believe they will lose their slim 50-50 majority.

The question for Democrats is this: Will the Democrats’ big-ticket legislation be enough of a panacea to keep the House? Our Canvass participants tell us that the big issues in 2022, predictably, will be Covid-19 and the economy. Only 5% of Democrats believe infrastructure will play a big role. Inflation, supply chain and other economy related issues are also top of mind for voters ahead of the 2022 midterms.

THE LOCUST STREET GROUP TAKEAWAYS

Check out the takeaways from our polling partners at the Locus Street Group.

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