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Is divided government--a Republican president and a Democratic Congress--the product of diminished competition for seats in the U.S. House of Representatives? In this groundbreaking study, Gary C. Jacobson uses a detailed analysis of the evolution of competition in postwar House elections to argue that the problems Republicans face in seeking House seats are political rather than structural. With abundant graphic illustration, he shows that divided government is only one piece of a much broader electoral pattern that is creating new opportunities as well as new barriers to partisan change in the House, He examines shifts in the incumbency advantage, campaign finance practices, the "swing ratio," and other related phenomena, but he turns up little evidence that they are to blame for divided government. More important, he argues, are trends in partisan opposition: the quality of candidates, campaigns, issues, and career strategies. As individual candidates and campaigns have become more important in winning elections, the weakness of Republican House candidacies has prevented the party from taking more seats away from the Democrats. Jacobson contends that the House is not nearly as insulated from electoral change as recent elections might suggest. The notion that House elections are no longer capable of reflecting popular preferences is, he concludes, simply wrong.

Intro -- Contents -- List of Tables -- List of Figures -- Preface -- ONE / Introduction -- TWO / The Coevolution of Affect toward Presidents and Parties -- THREE / Evaluations of Parties and Party Leaders -- FOUR / Assessments of Party Competence -- FIVE / Cognitive Views of Parties -- SIX / Party Identification I: Partisan Change -- SEVEN / Party Identification II: Generational Imprinting -- EIGHT / Elections -- NINE / Polarized Parties, the 2016 Elections, and the Early Trump Presidency -- TEN / Conclusion -- Appendix: Data Sources -- References -- Index

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Tables -- Figures -- Preface -- ONE. Introduction -- TWO. The Coevolution of Affect toward Presidents and Parties -- THREE. Evaluations of Parties and Party Leaders -- FOUR. Assessments of Party Competence -- FIVE. Cognitive Views of Parties -- SIX. Party Identification I: Partisan Change -- SEVEN. Party Identification II: Generational Imprinting -- EIGHT. Elections -- NINE. Polarized Parties, the 2016 Elections, and the Early Trump Presidency -- TEN. Conclusion -- APPENDIX. Data Sources -- References -- Index

AbstractThis article extends the analysis of how presidents influence popular beliefs and feelings about their parties to include Donald Trump's full term and the first 2 years of Joe Biden's presidency. The results from examination of hundreds of surveys confirm that both presidents, like their predecessors, have strongly influenced evaluations of their parties generally and of their congressional wings specifically. They have also had a powerful impact on assessments of their party's competence in dealing with the COVID‐19 pandemic and on voters' preferences in their midterm election. For the most part, Trump's impact has been notably greater than Biden's, whose influence generally matches that of earlier presidents. Trump also stands out as having a larger and more consistent impact on opinions of the opposition, and he is exceptional in continuing to influence his party's reputation and standing after leaving office.

Donald Trump's claim that he actually won the 2020 election, that Joe Biden's victory was fraudulent and that his presidency is thus illegitimate, has been exhaustively debunked, but large majorities of ordinary Republicans and other Trump voters continue to say they agree with him. Using a wide variety of survey data, this paper examines the dimensions and origins of belief in Trump's big lie and its effects on the Republican Party, the 2022 elections, and U.S. politics going forward.

The 2022 midterm elections tested both American democracy's resilience and the referendum theory of midterm elections. Democracy met the test better than the theory. For several reasons, Democrats lost far fewer House seats than referendum models predicted given Biden's low approval ratings, inflation, and an unhappy electorate. Trump's meddling in nomination politics on behalf of his big lie and the Court's Dobbs decision put democracy and abortion on the agenda, mobilizing Democrats and redefining what was at stake in the election. The referendum was also blunted by hardened political attitudes that minimized partisan defections and by independents who voted for Democrats despite negative opinions of Biden. Overall voting patterns showed record levels of continuity and cohesion in 2022, reiterating the stark political divisions that have emerged over the past decade.

AbstractReactions to the divisive person and presidency of Donald Trump dominated voting decisions in the 2020 elections, which consequently set new records for electoral continuity, party loyalty, nationalization, polarization, and presidential influence on the down‐ballot vote choices, to the point where local factors such as incumbency, candidate quality, and campaign spending barely registered in the congressional election results. Evaluations of Trump's leadership in the national crises besetting the United States in 2020 were assimilated almost entirely into existing attitudes toward the president, limiting the impact of these events. The Democrats achieved unified control of the government, but by the narrowest of margins, and the political configuration that had emerged from Trump's election in 2016 remained largely intact. Republicans' responses to Trump's seditious efforts to nullify Biden's victory promise to extend his influence through the 2022 elections and beyond.

AbstractDonald Trump's bid to nullify Joseph Biden's victory in the 2020 presidential election was a grotesque assault on American democracy that ultimately provoked an invasion of the Capitol by a right‐wing mob trying to derail certification of Biden's victory. Although most Americans were appalled by his actions, Trump retained the support of nearly three quarters of ordinary Republicans, most subscribing to this big lie of a stolen election. This poses dilemma for Republican leaders hoping to hold Trump's base without narrowing their party's appeal to the broader electorate. This article investigates the parameters of their dilemma by examining how the public in general and Republican voters in particular have responded to Trump's attempt to steal the election from Biden and what these reactions imply for the party's future.