Trump’s “Fossil Fuel Voters” Are a Myth
By Danielle Deiseroth and Julian Brave NoiseCat
Last week, Democratic nominee Joe Biden and President Trump sparred for the last time before the November 3 election. Unlike the first debate, which felt less like a debate and more like if the two old guys from the Muppets starred in an episode of WWE SmackDown, Biden and Trump spent the evening presenting starkly different approaches to critical issues, including climate change. In the final minutes of the exchange, when pressed by President Trump on whether or not he would “close down the oil industry,” Biden responded by stating his plan would “transition” away from fossil fuels and “stop giving them federal subsidies.”
While Trump hoped to pigeonhole Biden into a gaffe that would cost him votes among key swing state voters, the data suggests another interpretation. In the days following the second debate, Data for Progress asked likely voters across the nation whether they think the federal government should subsidize the fossil fuel industry. To simulate what happened at the debate, we assessed support for ending fossil fuel subsidies by pitting Biden’s and Trump’s arguments against each other.
According to our polling, a plurality (49 percent) of likely voters agree that American taxpayers should not spend billions of dollars each year bailing out the fossil fuel industry and should instead invest that money to create new jobs in clean energy. A majority of voters who self-identify as Democrats (67 percent) and a plurality of those who self-identify as independents (50 percent) also want to end fossil fuel subsidies and invest in clean energy. Unsurprisingly, a majority of voters who self-identify as Republicans (58 percent) would prefer to keep fossil fuel subsidies and American jobs in the industry.
Trump’s attacks on Biden’s climate plan are nothing new. Just as in the first debate, Trump tried to paint Joe Biden as a radical socialist plotting to pass A.O.C’s Green New Deal, a Stalin-esque proposal that, according to the President, would expropriate hamburgers, ground airplanes, kill jobs, raise electricity bills, and shrink windows. “They want to take buildings down because they want to make bigger windows into smaller windows,” said the President on Thursday night. “As far as they’re concerned, if you had no window, it would be a lovely thing.”
It is perhaps unsurprising that all but the most die-hard Trump supporters do not believe such things. When we presented likely voters with messaging from both candidates about Biden’s climate plan, a majority (61 percent) found Biden’s climate message more persuasive than Trump’s. An overwhelming majority of Democrats (83 percent) and a majority of independents (59 percent) preferred Biden’s position. Republicans, however, are nearly split. A plurality (42 percent) found Trump’s message more convincing, but over a third (35 percent) chose Biden’s message.
As voters look to Congress for much-needed investments to create jobs and new infrastructure projects after the coronavirus recession, they also show clear preferences for clean energy. A majority of voters (68 percent) think Congress should prioritize clean energy over fossil fuels in future infrastructure packages. And this view crosses party lines. A majority of Democrats (84 percent) and independents (68 percent), as well as a plurality of Republicans (48 percent), prefer clean energy infrastructure over fossil fuels.
Though Trump walked onto the debate stage last week hoping for a much-needed win, his fossil fuel attacks probably didn’t score many points against Biden. While the President spent months knocking the Green New Deal and fear mongering about supposedly “radical” Democratic plans, these claims have not stuck. In Trump’s delusional campaign world, a cavalry of swing-state voters determined to protect the fossil fuel industry will ride to his rescue on November 3. In reality, most voters know that fossil fuels are part of the past—and that we will all be better off once they are. Should Biden prevail, he will enter the White House with the confidence that the public supports his plans to transition the United States to clean energy.
Danielle Deiseroth (@danielledeis) is the Climate Data Analyst for Data for Progress
Julian Brave NoiseCat (@jnoisecat) is Vice President of Policy & Strategy for Data for Progress
Survey Methodology
From October 24 to October 25, 2020, Data for Progress conducted a survey of 979 likely voters nationally using web panel respondents. The sample was weighted to be representative of likely voters by age, gender, education, race, and voting history. The survey was conducted in English. The margin of error is ±3.1 percentage points.