(iPoster) Partisan Advantage, Elite Messaging and Public Opinion on the Senate Filibuster

• In Event: Poster Session: Public Opinion in the United States

Abstract

Behavioral scholarship has long suggested that public opinion on the U.S. Senate filibuster has only entrenched partisan views over time, with conservative partisans favorable toward the minority protection and liberal partisans unfavorable. At the same time, recent work on public opinion on democratic norms and preferences has revealed that otherwise stable attitudes have become increasingly contingent on partisan messaging.

This project considers the dynamics of public opinion on the filibuster in the two most recent federal elections. We collect data with questionnaires embedded in the 2022 and 2024 Cooperative Election Study national surveys. In the first study, we conduct a survey experiment aimed to leverage the 2022 midterm election as a treatment of shifting partisan alignment. We find that knowledgeable respondents were likely to shift support for the filibuster in the expected directions: Democrats increased favorability toward filibuster reform after the election while Republicans decreased favorability toward reform after the election. In the second study, we conducted a survey experiment to consider how responsive respondents are to elite messages in favor of filibuster reform. The findings will demonstrate the stability of public opinion on the filibuster in the short run. Altogether, these experiments offer a new perspective on public opinion and Congressional activity that has implications for democratic accountability, responsiveness, and institutional work.

Authors

• Nathan Barron, University of Oklahoma

• Rachel Blum, University of Oklahoma

• Charles Finocchiaro, University of Oklahoma

• Peter T McLaughlin, University of Rhode Island

• Peter Matthew Olson, University of Oklahoma

• Joy Divine Rhodes, The University of Oklahoma

• Michael Crespin, University of Oklahoma