POLLING THE PEOPLE

November 4, 1998
		Americans went to the polls on Tuesday, but what where the issues that motivated them? Phil Ponce talks with three pollsters and a policy analyst about the mindset of the American voter.

Nov. 4, 1998: Recap from Shields and Gigot Nov. 3, 1998: Election '98 analysis from Shields and Gigot. Nov. 3, 1998: Election night results. Oct. 28, 1998: Political reporters look at the latest GOP ads criticizing Pres. Clinton. Oct. 28, 1998: NewsHour coverage of the New York Senate race Oct. 27, 1998: A profile of Texas Governor George W. Bush. Oct. 22, 1998: RealAudio and RealVideo versions of some campaign ads. Browse the NewsHour's coverage of, Election '98 index PBS' Election '98     U.S. Senate House of Representatives Yahoo! election coverage	PHIL PONCE: For a profile of who came out to vote and what may have been on their minds we get the perspectives of three pollsters and one public policy analyst, Andrew Kohut, director of the non-partisan Pew Research Center for the People and the Press; Peter Hart, Democratic pollster and co-director of the NBC-Wall Street Journal Poll; Michael Dabadie, a Republican pollster at the polling firm Wirthlin Worldwide; and we hope to be joined by Yvonne Scruggs-Leftwich, executive director of the Black Leadership Forum. There's a terrible traffic jam here in Washington, and she's been stuck in it. Andy, give us an overview of what - of what the profile of the electorate looked like this time around.
	Profile of the electorate
	ANDREW KOHUT: Well, comparatively, there were more moderates in this electorate. There were fewer conservatives, fewer members of really just right, self-professed members of the religious right. And there were older voters, and as a consequence, there were fewer younger voters, and these tendencies were underscored or punctuated. Those are national tendencies. If we went to some of the key races in the South, we saw more African-American voters, particularly - and I'll read a few figures - in Maryland, the percentage in the gubernatorial race, the African-Americans rose from 12 percent four years ago to 21 percent in North Carolina. The percentage of African-Americans rose from 16 to 20, and the Georgia gubernatorial from 16 to 29, that's almost a doubling. So, the Democratic constituencies, moderates, fewer conservatives, this was a different electorate attitudinally and in some ways demographically. PHIL PONCE: Andy, what does the polling say about which - who did a better job of getting out there and getting out their base? ANDREW KOHUT: Well, clearly, the Democrats did a relatively better job in absolute terms, probably more Republicans did vote. It's almost a fact of life. But apart from who voted, what is really different about this election from previous - from '94 and from '96 - is the rates at which Democratic groups voted Democratic versus Republican groups, not voting nearly as Republican as they did in the past, and the most striking one is in gender. Women, who were supposedly disillusion and disheartened and demoralized by President Clinton, voted in the national race at almost a 60/40 rate for Democrats, while men's vote - divided just about evenly - only tipped a little bit to the Republicans. In key Senate races, such as Schumer/D'Amato in New York, and Boxer/Fong in California, we see the same pattern, women voting more heavily Democratic than men voting Republican. And this pattern of the Democrats being more cohesive and more galvanized was apparent also in some of the income categories. Republicans did not do nearly as well among affluent people, among college graduates, and these are traditionally core Republican groups and Democrats did the better among - continue to do very well among lower income people. So it's a case of the Democrats - of getting out their vote - and also getting out the vote with a purpose, if not a vengeance.
	Voter vengeance
	PHIL PONCE: Mr. Hart, what was the purpose? What was the vengeance? PETER HART: Well, I think the Democrats came out because they had issues that they cared about, simply put. Democrats ran on the issues from education to health care, to Social Security, to jobs. All of those things counted a lot. Over half the voters said this is what we care about. Republicans ran to the short sight of the field. They ran on impeachment. They ran on scandal. And they've got some moral vote and a little bit of taxes. But, as Sen. McConnell said, they didn't have an issue agenda. And the Democrats did. And it was a lot better. And the other thing that Andy said that's so important here is that if you look at the turnout in 1998, it looked a lot more like a general election for president than it did in off-year elections. And Democrats got their people out to vote, but it was more than just simply organized. I think, at the same time the Republicans ran a campaign that started to nationalize it, because one of the things we saw in our NBC-Wall Street Journal Poll is a month earlier the Republicans had all the intensity and at the end it was the Democratic intensity. And I think it's because the Republicans chose to nationalize it at the end, and it really didn't work well for them. PHIL PONCE: Did the Republicans try to nationalize it at the end, Mr. Dabadie? MICHAEL DABADIE: Well, I think we need to look at this from two perspectives. The first is in the campaigns, themselves, and then what was the national poll showing from post-election polls. In the campaigns, themselves, as Sen. McConnell said, you had a lot of races where local issues were very important. For example, in Illinois 11, in that particular race you had very critical issues, such as an arsenal in veteran's cemetery. That was very important in the race. In Wisconsin 1, you had issues such as Social Security and taxes, which were critical issues and were won by the Republican. If you look, though, in the national campaign, at what issues were falling out in the post-election polls that were coming out nationally, issues that were dominating were certainly education and Social Security. But below that were issues relating to restoring honesty and integrity to government and fighting for stronger families. Now, in relation to that, Republicans did very, very well in those issues in particular with restoring honesty and integrity, almost a 20 or 30 point margin advantage, and also on fighting for strong families. It is true, however, that within education and Social Security, that was a battleground and that was a dogfight, and in a lot of ways Republicans did not make the gains that they were hoping for in relation to those two specific issues. PHIL PONCE: We're joined now by Yvonne Scruggs-Leftwich, who is the executive director of the Black Leadership Forum. Congratulations on getting out of that traffic mess. YVONNE SCRUGGS-LEFTWICH, Black Leadership Forum: A worse challenge than yesterday, I'll tell you. PHIL PONCE: Early in the program, the observation was made about the strong black turnout. What was the motivation for that? YVONNE SCRUGGS-LEFTWICH: Well, I think there were two motivations. One was proactive and one was reactive. One was in response to constant emphasis on the importance of the election, on the stakeholder position of African-Americans, on their investment in taking responsibility for being real determining for the participant. And the other one was a reaction to what has been going on in Washington, the fact that the issues that are highest on the African-American agenda are - many of them are the ones that were given short shrift by Congress and were in some instances not addressed at all. The school situation, quality of education, quality of the educational facilities, teachers in the classroom, health care, health bill of rights, Social Security, their voice being heard on such issues as hate crimes legislation, all of these things were sort of taken - given a back seat as Congress obsessed about things that in the African-American community, quite frankly, are seen largely as not relevant for the Congress and for policymaking. PHIL PONCE: And are you referring specifically to the threat of impeachment? YVONNE SCRUGGS-LEFTWICH: Well, that and the constant barrage of fallacious releases by Congress from the Starr investigation, the fact that the African-American community found it very different and very difficult to make the segway from what was in the Starr Report to what had started the investigation and finally - I don't want to lose this point - there was a great - strong feeling that the African-American community understands unfairness when it sees it. And there was a reaction to the unfairness that was perceived to be directed at President Clinton and the desire to prosecute him no matter what, and this was seen as very reminiscent of things that happen to African-Americans on a daily basis. And so all of those things converged with the leadership of the churches, Operation Big Vote, which is an old and very sophisticated operation for getting out the vote, and the African-American community, quite frankly, responded to all of these forces. And we had a wonderful turnout. I mean, it was amazing for those of us who are old political hands to walk in polling places where flies sleep in midterm elections and to see lines and queues for people to vote and just great activity around the polling places. In sophisticated, jaundiced places like New York City I could not believe it. And I'm a New Yorker, so I can afford to call it "jaundiced," but Atlanta too and other places where voting has been kind of a lackadaisical and indifferent on the mid-terms. PHIL PONCE: Andy, to what extent - looking at voters in general, to what extent was the election a "referendum on the President?" What do the pollings show?
	A referendum on the president?
	ANDREW KOHUT: It was not a referendum on the President. This was a referendum on good times, and our headline today was "Good Times Trump Clinton's Troubles." And that's really what it came down to. 80 percent of Americans said that the economy was excellent or good, and that's almost double the percentage who said that four years ago. And most people - 40 percent - expected to be better off next year - twice as many as said that four years ago. And the Democrats won the credit game because the public credits the President more than the Congress, which is typical for a good economy and good conditions. But largely when the exit pollsters said, were you voting for the President or voting against the President, it was pretty much awash - 20 percent for, 20 percent against. Now there were these backlash undercurrents that we saw throughout the campaign in this last week that galvanized the Democratic vote. But for the most part people were voting for continuity. They were voting for not rocking the boat. And not rocking the boat also includes not impeaching the President. PHIL PONCE: And, Mr. Hart, how about - we heard the earlier observation talking about rocking the boat and possible backlash. The observation was made that those late - those late-term ads on the part of Republicans were a mistake. Does the evidence bear that out? PETER HART: Ill advised. I mean, Andy and I looked at this election throughout the year, and it was a great year for incumbents. I mean, only about 11 incumbents lost all year for Senate, for governor, and for all the House races that they were. And what happened is the Republicans took a gamble and this was Newt Gingrich, in 1994, it paid off nationalizing the election. By putting out the ads, they took it away from everything that Andy had been talking about, and that is peace, prosperity, and patriotism with John Glenn in space. And what happened is they took a Republican Southern play book, and that was Lott and Gingrich, and they decided to run the divisive issues. There was a Northern Republican play book that won overwhelmingly, and those were the governors from Pataki to Engler to Ridge, straight across the North, and if they'd taken that play book, they would have been playing into the strength that Andy was talking about? PHIL PONCE: Did they use the wrong play book, Republicans here? MICHAEL DABADIE: Well, I agree with Peter in the sense that issues have to be defined in a personally relevant way. And when you talk about the Lewinsky scandal, to go back to the discussion that we were having, certainly this was an election where voters were very happy. 55 percent said the country was headed in the right direction -- economically - ¾ said that it was headed in the right direction. But if you look at the Lewinsky scandal itself in some of those races, I don't want to throw the blanket and say as a blanket statement it was right, or is it wrong - because in some races it may have helped. The objective of what was done was to try to increase coalitional turnout. In some cases that happened. In some cases it may not have. But in our exit polling and in our post-election study, it didn't matter either way. 68 percent said they voted for the Republican. 62 percent said they voted for the Democrat. The entire vote was 22 against the Democrat, 27 against the Republican. And when we flesh that out and allow voters to tell us just open-ended to what extent was Clinton a factor in this Lewinsky issue, it's a wash either way. Now, in terms of African-American turnout, probably so. That may have happened in a couple of races. I have to say I think I was pretty surprised coming from Louisiana and the bayous, myself, in that race with Baker, that that race was as close as it was because of - PHIL PONCE: And the issues you're talking about - MICHAEL DABADIE: This is with Congressman Baker and Marjorie Makitman down in that race, the prominent Democratic name in Louisiana, and that race was very close, and not expected to be that close, however, by a lot of folks, even some of the Democrats. However, I have to say it was very surprising to see the African-American community coalesce the way it did. The African-American community in Louisiana is very divided in a lot of ways, very divided. However, they came together. That happened in North Carolina. It happened in a lot of races. It did not happen in some other races. That has to be dissected exactly in Kentucky. That has to be dissected race by race, as we were talking about earlier with Sen. McConnell, on which issues were playing out. YVONNE SCRUGGS-LEFTWICH: Yes. And the other point is that the African-American community has also entered prosperity. The recent poll by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies for the first time shows that African-Americans consider themselves to be better off economically this year than they were last year. And so in addition to not wanting to rock the boat in social terms, very fundamental economic reasons for the African-American community wanting the federal government to pay attention to their issues and keep things getting better and to give them an opportunity to cash in on the prosperity and for the changes that have taken place. PHIL PONCE: And that's where we have to leave it. I thank you all very much.