I'm not sure what Republican party Washington Post contributor Katherine Clayton is observing, but the fact she's a Ph.D. Poly Sci student at Stanford shows in this depressingly naive analysis of the Liz Cheney ousting.
In new research, I find that this internal battle may push away Republicans who aren’t particularly committed to their party — those who call themselves “not very strong Republicans” or who consider themselves political independents who lean toward the GOP.
From March 14 to 25, I administered a survey experiment to a nationally representative sample of 1,876 Americans, using the Lucid platform. I randomly divided participants into three groups. Before answering questions, I had the first group read a news article excerpt that described prominent Republican and Democratic lawmakers clashing over whether Joe Biden legitimately won in the 2020 presidential election. The second group read about internal conflict among Republican lawmakers over the issue. The third group read no information at all, and simply took the survey.
All three groups then answered questions about their attitudes toward each party; whether they believed the opposing party posed a threat to democracy, and if so, how much; and whether they believed that the U.S. political system needs a major third party.
Does conflict within the party push Republicans away? It depends on their convictions.
When Democrats or strongly committed Republicans read about clashing GOP lawmakers, it had little or no effect on their attitudes. They were no more or less committed to the party, and they felt no more or less strongly about the opposing party’s threat to democracy, than those in a control group.
But Republicans with weaker commitments to the party did lose faith in the party after reading about GOP conflict. I used a measure of overall party opinion that takes into account favorable or unfavorable attitudes toward the party as well as trust in the party to handle U.S. problems. After reading about the GOP’s internal clashes, weak Republicans’ overall opinion of the party dropped by about six percentage points, compared with the control group or the group who read about clashes between the parties.
However, less committed Republicans did not become more interested in a potential third party. That’s bad news for any possible Republican Party offshoot, which probably wouldn’t gain traction among elected officials or voters.
Instead, weaker Republicans who read about GOP conflict over the election started thinking more highly of the Democratic Party, and became less likely to view it as a threat. Their opinion toward the Democratic Party grew six percentage points more favorable, and belief that the Democratic Party threatens democracy dropped by eight percentage points.
In other words, the Republican Party’s internal civil war could push some less committed Republican voters to the Democrats.
How do I put this gently?
Bullshit.
What she's describing is the ghostly uncommitted voter, the political independent, the voter that we proved didn't exist in the era of Trump. People like that just don't bother to vote at all. They're turned off by "both sides" and skip the hassle.
We know that 80% of Republicans approved of the purge of Liz Cheney, and the majority of Republicans still think the election was stolen by the Democrats. They're not going to view the Democratic party "more favorably". This is wrong just like the 2020 polling was wrong in several aspects: Republicans lie to pollsters.
I can tell you now though that anyone who still identifies as a Republican is never, never going to actually vote for the Democrats. That instinct will be brutally purged from them just as easily as Liz Cheney was purged from the GOP by 2022.
The rest will stay home.
That's the best we can hope for.
The remaining Republicans are Authoritarians for Trump. Keep that in mind.
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