(09/02/2026) NY Times article

"More Americans Are Identifying as Democrats Ahead of Midterms"

(and reposted by several media outlets)

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Data from Gallup shows that Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents have their largest advantage over Republicans since 2008.

 

The share of Americans who associate themselves with the Democratic Party has grown significantly over the past year, according to data from Gallup. The shift, which signals the party’s largest advantage since 2008, is the latest sign of backlash against Republicans and the president ahead of the midterm elections.

 

The latest data shows Democrats with a 10-percentage-point advantage over Republicans when voters are asked which party they identify with and when independent voters are asked which party they lean toward.

 

The findings come as President Trump’s approval rating has been below 40 percent for months, and as polls have found that Democrats are competitive across key Senate races in states that went heavily for Mr. Trump in past years. But shifts in party identification do not necessarily translate directly into votes, because independents, including those who lean toward a party, tend to be less politically engaged and less likely to vote.

 

Republicans and Democrats have seesawed between which party more Americans leaned toward over the last several years. As recently as 2024, Republicans and independents who lean toward the Republican Party held a slight edge over Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents.

 

The current advantage held by Democrats, though, is far wider than recent Republican leads and similar to the one the party held in 2020, when Joseph R. Biden Jr. won the presidency and the party gained a slim advantage in the House and the Senate. The high points in the last 35 years, according to Gallup, came in 2006 and 2008, when 52 percent of Americans identified as Democrats or leaned toward the party, helping Barack Obama win the White House by one of the largest margins in recent history.

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Democrats hold an advantage over Republicans in partisan identification

 

Party identification shifts are cyclical, according to Jeffrey Jones, a senior editor at Gallup.

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“When things are going well in the country, party identification shifts in the direction of the party in charge,” Dr. Jones said. “When things are going poorly, like they are now with an unpopular Republican president and people unhappy with the state of the nation, people are moving away from the party in charge.”

 

This phenomenon is what political scientists call thermostatic public opinion. Much like a home thermostat, which might click on the heat when the room gets too cold, attitudes of the U.S. public shift on a large scale when people feel that something may have gone too far.​