Congressional Democrats and Republicans each appear to face a challenge moving public opinion on impeachment as public hearings begin, since many Americans say their views are already locked in. There’s been essentially no change in the number who feel President Trump deserves to be impeached since last month, and now the public expresses dissatisfaction with the approaches of both congressional Democrats and the president thus far.
More Americans feel the Democrats have done a bad job handling the inquiry (52%) than a good job (48%.) And more feel President Trump has done a bad job handling it (56%) than feel he has handled it well (43%.)
Americans favor making at least some hearings public. A large majority think testimony should either be in open hearings (47%) or a mix of open and closed, depending on the sensitivity of the testimony (42%). Just 11% say hearings should be closed. More than half of Americans continue to approve of congressional Democrats having started the impeachment inquiry.
Eight in 10 Americans have an opinion on whether the president deserves to be impeached, and are divided today much as they have been for weeks, with 43% saying he does and 40% saying he does not. Seventeen percent say it is too soon to say, but many of them are also not paying as much attention.