Impeachment of Donald Trump Might Give Texas Independents a Role to Play in 2020

As the 2020 election campaign gets underway in Texas, independents have become more important -- and more interesting. They are more important because Texas elections appear to be more politically competitive than they’ve been since before the turn of the century. They are more interesting both because their votes have the possibility of determining some election outcomes, and because their responses to the most powerful political figure shaping the 2020 election, Donald Trump, are much more divided and less fixed than are those of traditional partisans, most noticeably on the subject of Trump’s impeachment. This combination of factors makes independent voters more consequential in Texas elections than at anytime in recent memory, yet harder to handicap when it comes to their voting behavior.

The intertwining of Republican electoral dominance in state elections and deepening partisan polarization has made it almost too easy to be flip about the impact of political independents. Independents have made up too thin a slice of the Texas electorate to make much of an electoral difference in a political milieu in which statewide races are routinely swept by double-digit margins, and most legislative and congressional races take place within districts drawn to heavily favor one party or the other. With the GOP electoral advnatage shrinking stateside and more gerrymandered districts made more competitive by population growth and accompanying demographic change, the electoral context that made indepdendents marginal has started to change.

When talking about independents, we’re referring to those voters who, when asked whether they identify as a Democrat, a Republican, an independent, or something else, tell us that they are either independent or identify some other way, and then tell us in a follow-up question that they neither lean towards the Democratic or Republican parties. These “true” independents, as we call them, make up approximately 10% of registered voters in Texas. Their share in the actual voting electorate varies, as their lack of partisanship is more often a sign of inattention and disinterest than a reflection of careful, nuanced, and contextual political considerations. In the most recent University of Texas/Texas Tribune Poll in October, 63% of true independents reported being either somewhat (29%) or extremely (34%) interested in politics, about 20 percentage points less than the share of self-identified Democrats and Republicans. About a third say that they are “not at all” or “not too enthusiastic” about voting in the 2020 election, a share that is about three times higher than partisans. 

Responses to the impeachment process among independents as a group are closely divided, and marked by more indecision than among partisans. While 84% of Democrats and 78% of Republicans think that the impeachment investigation is or isn’t justified, respectively, among independents, 46% say it is justified, 32% say it isn’t, and another 22% are unsure or unable to offer an opinion. Similarly, while 79% of Democrats think the president has taken actions that justify his removal from office, 79% of Republicans disagree. Among independents, 34% think the president’s actions justify removal while 33% think they do not - with another 33% unsure. When evaluating opinion change in light of the impeachment inquiry and the likely impeachment and trial, whether in Texas or nationally, it is most likely to be the attitudes of independents driving those changes either in reaction to new evidence, or as more independents without a professed opinion come off the sidelines as in response to information delivered through the politicking of partisans in both camps.

Independents are less torn in their judgments of the president’s job performance and personality traits, though with some interesting fluctuations. Trump’s job approval among independents has bounced around, which we should expect given their lack of partisanship, with a high of 55% expressing approval in October 2017 polling, and a low of 39% in February 2017 and October 2018. Most problematic, however, is the most recent poll in October 2019, fielded as the impeachment investigation began. In that poll, 51% expressed disapproval of his job performance with 41% approving. That -10 net-approval is his lowest measurement to date. It remains to be seen whether this data point is a blip, or reflects what independents are incorporating into their assessment of the president during the impeachment proceedings.

While the job approval numbers don’t offer any clear directional trend in independents’ assessment, as a group they have shown increasing skepticism of the president’s “softer” traits,” e.g. his empathy and honesty, while giving him higher marks for being a strong leader and his intelligence. For example, in October 2017 40% of Texas independents agreed that Trump cares about people like them, but since then, the share agreeing with that statement dropped by 11-points to 29% in June of 2019. Likewise, while independents were almost evenly split in their assessment of Donald Trump’s honesty and trustworthiness in October 2017, with 43% finding him honest and 46% disagreeing, by June of this year, 65% said that the president was not honest and trustworthy, continuing a trend over the two intermediary polls in which 50% and then 59% questioned the president’s honesty.

Other assessments of the president’s traits among independents show a far narrower decline in evaluations, but a decline nonetheless. When asked whether he has the temperament to serve effectively as president, 39% of independents said yes in June of this year compared with 42% at the end of 2017; 44% said that he is a strong leader compared to 53% in 2017; 40% said he was knowledgeable compared to 50% in 2017; and 45% found him competent in 2019 compared to 51% in 2017.

These changes can’t be attributed to some shift in underlying partisan preferences, such as becoming less favorably inclined toward Republicans writ large. Among independents, approval of Governor Greg Abbott’s job performance was 43% in October 2019, virtually unchanged since October 2017 when it was 45%. There have been some fluctuations -- disapproval of the Governor's job performance spiked amidst the 2016 presidential campaign --  but his approval numbers have been far more consistent over the last two and a half years period than the various assessments of Trump.

The negative reactions to impeachment among a significant share of independents comes as the group’s potential to materially impact elections has increased. While we’ve been quick to dismiss the oft-asserted importance of independent voters, the 2020 election may be different. Abbott defeated Lupe Valdez in 2018 by 13-points, but it was Senator Cruz’s narrow 2.6-point victory over Beto O’Rourke that led both Democrats and Republicans to a more serious consideration of Texas’ competitiveness. According to exit polling of that race, 93% of Republicans voted for Abbott, basically indistinguishable from the 91% who voted for Cruz. And while 92% of Democrats voted for O’Rourke, a very similar share (87%) voted for Valdez, a candidate with only a fraction of the name recognition and comparatively little money. But among independents (defined more broadly by exit polling standards, but still illustrative), Abbott beat Valdez by 15 points (55% to 40%) while O’Rourke beat Cruz by 3 points (50% to 47%), an 18 percentage point swing. UT/Texas Tribune polling on the eve of early voting followed the same pattern subsequently expressed in the election. Independent votes provide part of the explanation for the differences in the victory margins between GOP candidates who won comfortably (like Abbott) and those whose margins were less convincing (like Cruz and Lt. Governor Patrick). 

As partisan forces mobilize to fight over the competitive legislative and congressional districts that are at center stage in the 2020 Texas elections, the doubts that the president’s impeachment might be generating among Texas independents could make those voters more consequential. Even though he wasn’t on the ballot in 2018, Donald Trump’s presidency nationalized that election in 2018, and attitudes toward him were one of the major factors driving increased turnout in Texas, as elsewhere. Trump will of course be at the top of the ballot in 2020,  and both parties will continue to make any and every attempt to frame the impeachment process so as to mobilize core supporters who are already with them. If unease with the top of the Republican ticket among independents proves durable, current officeholders and aspirants accustomed to the default mobilization of their partisan foot soldiers may well have to pay more attention to independent voters, at least in the larger-than-usual handful of districts that are in play. Democrats haven’t proven apt at appealing to these voters in many recent cycles while Republicans have not needed the votes. As with so many other things, Donald Trump’s presence may have rewritten the usual script for both parties as we draw the curtain on the 2020 Texas elections.