In our increasingly polarized politics, the middle of the electorate — swing voters, independents and soft partisans — has become crucial in measuring public opinion.
If you don’t have the middle on your side in a particular debate, you’re not going to get a majority of public support, or close to it.
And that’s true from the results of our most recent NBC News poll, where just 41 percent of independents say they hold former President Donald Trump “solely” or “mainly responsible for the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Overall in the poll, 45 percent of all respondents say they hold Trump responsible — down from 52 percent who said this in the days after the attack.
If the upcoming congressional hearings on the Jan. 6 attack are going to be successful for Democrats (as well as Reps. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., and Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill.) in shaping public opinion, it will need to start with these independents.
