GOP Is Blamed More Than Dems For Dysfunctional Congress

All recent polls have shown that the public is still extremely unhappy with the job (or lack of it) that Congress is currently doing. A plurality of Americans (45%) believe this Congress is getting even less done than previous Congresses, and another 24% believe this Congress is just as bad as recent Congresses. Only 5% believes this Congress is actually accomplishing more than usual.

Those are terrible numbers for Congress. So, who does the public think is to blame for the dysfunctional 115th Congress. A plurality of 44% blame just the Republicans, while only 11% blame just the Democrats. About 40% blame both parties equally. To put it another way, about 84% blame the Republicans either wholly or partially, while 51% blame the Democrats either wholly or partially.

Some have said the 2018 election could be a "wave" election -- an election that flips control of one or both houses of Congress. These numbers would tend to support that belief.

The charts were made from information in a new Economist / YouGov Poll -- done between September 3rd and 5th of a random national sample of 1,500 adults (including 1,309 registered voters), with a 3 point margin of error.