Poll Watch Daily

While Americans who are worried about the federal deficit often oppose some of the proposals to achieve that, a new Gallup poll finds they are against raising the federal debt ceiling despite warnings from administration officials and financial leaders that failure to do so could be catastrophic if the U.S. can’t meet its obligations.

Forty-seven percent said they don’t want their member of Congress to vote for a raise in the debt ceiling compared to 19 percent who favor doing so, with 34 percent answering that they don’t know enough to say, according to the poll conducted May 5-8.

There is a sharp partisan divide on the issue. Seventy percent of Republicans want a vote against raising the debt ceiling. A small plurality of Democrats favor raising the ceiling (33 percent) while 26 percent oppose doing so, with 40 percent expressing no opinion. Independents oppose raising the ceiling by a 46 percent to 15 percent margin, with 40 percent expressing no opinion.

Gallup’s result is not as stark as the one produced by a CNN/Opinion Research poll conducted April 29-May 1 in which 60 percent opposed a raise in the debt ceiling, compared to 37 percent who favored it, with 4 percent undecided. CNN’s polling director, Keating Holland, said one reason the opposition is so high may be because Americans weren’t buying the dire predictions of what would happen if the U.S. defaulted on its debt, with only 17 percent believing it would lead to a crisis. (However, the poll showed another 41 percent said it would cause “major problems).

The debt ceiling is due to be hit on Monday, although the Treasury Department says it can take a variety of steps to postpone the real moment-of-truth until Aug. 2. The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday that some Republican conservatives say Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner is exaggerating the dangers of not raising the ceiling by the August date.

Both political parties continue to maneuver and negotiate on the issue. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, while expressing willingness to strike a ‘grand bargain” with President Obama and the Democrats, said an agreement to increase the limit must be accompanied by federal spending cuts plus some kind of effort to rein in Medicare costs, even if it is not as sweeping as that proposed by House Republicans. The House plan caught enough political flak after congressmen returned to their districts over the recent recess, that some Republicans have been backing away from it.

Gallup said of the results of its poll: “Americans conditioned by so much news coverage of the enormous federal budget deficit may be reacting to the idea of raising the debt ceiling more in the context of a political deficit discussion as opposed to a financial market implications context. Nevertheless, the public’s perceptions are clearly negative, suggesting the debt ceiling vote is a political hurdle lawmakers will need to overcome.”

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