Executive Summary

We have entered a new stage in the 2006 election campaign, where Republicans now have become part of the problem too. These are voters that Republicans can potentially reclaim, but that effort to reconsolidate the base will be difficult, take time and be watched across the electorate. As we can see in this latest Democracy Corps poll, Democrats can run a campaign to change Washington so it works for ordinary Americans and can offer an agenda that dominates any Republican claims on progress.

But the starting point is George Bush, who every day is nationalizing this election on our terms. Other polls show breathtaking drops on job approval, but even more so for specific areas, like the war on terrorism and Iraq. He was already low on the economy. In this survey, he hits historic lows on the
country’s direction and specifically, on changing Bush’s direction. With his personal approval hitting new lows here, we very much want 2006 to be about Bush’s stewardship for the country. For sure, as we saw this past week, the Republicans will seek to make this about something else.

The disillusionment now has swept into the Republican loyalist world. Overall, we have seen a dramatic drop in the number of voters who “strongly approve" of Bush’s handling of the job. That fell 8 points this month to only 22 percent. The drop in enthusiasm was led by his base. Less than half of Republicans give him a strong approval rating - down 15 points; among conservatives, down 14 points; white married men, down 14 points.

Our analysis of the Republican loyalist groups shows a sharp slippage among white rural voters and blue collar men, as well as the best-educated and upscale married men - even before the last controversies around port security and the Iraq “civil war."

Methodology
This memo is based on a Democracy Corps survey of 1,135 likely voters conducted February 23-27, 2006.

Key Findings

• We have entered a new stage in the 2006 election campaign, where Republican voters now have become part of the problem for the GOP.
  
• In this poll, 18 percent of 2004 Bush voters are voting Democratic for Congress, while only 9 percent of Kerry voters are voting Republican.
• The mess in Washington and globally has created an electorate desperate for ideas and policies that will help ordinary Americans and the country.
• The strongest agenda includes raising the minimum wage, repealing the tax loophole that encourages companies to move operations overseas, replacing Bush’s prescription drug plan with a simple one that controls costs, implementing all the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, and creating tax incentives to expand the development of wind, solar, and biofuel technologies