Abstracts from the Washington Examiner (and H/T to AEI):
Overall:
- Republicans who identify as “conservative” increased from 62 percent in 2000 to 68 percent in 2015 (+8).
- Democrats who identify as “liberal” increased from 29 percent in 2000 to 45 percent in 2015 (+16).
- White Democrats who identify as liberal nearly doubled from 28 percent to 50 percent (+22).
2016 early primaries: Democratic electorate is getting more liberal, but that it is shrinking.
- More than two-thirds of voters in each of the first three Democratic primary states (Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada) call themselves liberal. That share increased 14, 11 and 25 percentage points respectively from 2008.
- Leftward trend isn’t due to a surge of liberal voters into the Democratic electorate. Democrat turnout was down significantly in all three states, and self-identified liberals remained roughly steady in each of them compared to 2008.
- Moderates and conservatives plummeted 46 percent, 38 percent and 64 percent, respectively. Barone concludes that the liberal polices promoted by Sanders and Clinton are leaving centrist and conservative Democrats on the sidelines or looking for other options.
