Advertisement

PolitiFact: Republicans ads attack Democrats for voting with Obama

 
A series of 14 identical video ads released by a conservative political action committee attacks Democrats for how often their votes lined up with the president.
A series of 14 identical video ads released by a conservative political action committee attacks Democrats for how often their votes lined up with the president.
Published Oct. 24, 2014

In many races this election season, the favorite Republican talking point against Democratic incumbents is how often they voted with President Barack Obama.

The Republican Party of Virginia said Sen. Mark Warner voted with Obama 97 percent of the time, and PolitiFact rated that True. Republican Scott Brown said New Hampshire Sen. Jeanne Shaheen voted with Obama 99 percent of the time: Mostly True. In Arkansas, Rep. Tom Cotton said Sen. Mark Pryor voted with Obama 93 percent of the time: also Mostly True.

Here's more evidence of just how popular it is: Last week, conservative political action committee Americans for Prosperity released 14 videos attacking 14 Democratic candidates for the House and Senate — all of them identical, adjusted for the candidate's name and specific presidential support voting record.

Of the 16 Senate races with a Democrat incumbent running for another term, we found that at least 10 Republican challengers have wielded the claim against their opponent.

"That someone votes with Obama — that's all someone needs to hear," said Leonard Steinhorn, an expert in political communication at American University and a former speechwriter. "That association between Obama and the candidate is enough to rally the base."

The numbers show more than Democratic loyalty to the president, though. They're indicative of the increasing partisan divide in Congress. An analysis of congressional votes shows historically low presidential support from the opposition party — and record-high presidential support in his own party. These voting patterns have nuances that get lost in campaign soundbites.

Where do the numbers come from?

Presidents don't cast votes in Congress, so it's not possible to do a true vote comparison. But Republicans don't pull these statistics out of a hat, either.

The statistics come from CQ Roll Call, which tracks congressional data. Since 1953, when Dwight D. Eisenhower became president, CQ has calculated presidential support from congressional votes.

In its vote studies, CQ editors select votes to track based on clear statements made by the president or his spokespersons. Members' scores reflect how often they vote in agreement with the president's position.

The analyzed votes, though, are a fraction of all votes that Congress takes. In 2013, Obama took a position on 20.8 percent of all congressional votes, nearly a 20-year high.

Presidents will primarily comment on the most important votes and rarely the minor ones, said Sarah Binder, an expert on Congress and a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. When Obama has expressed an opinion on a vote, he has tended to get the support of his party.

"Even accounting for the selectivity of the presidential position taking, those measures are not bad proxies of incumbent Democrats' alignment with the president," she said.

The rise in the talking point's popularity coincides with Senate Democrats voting with Obama 96 percent of the time in 2013, the "highest level of support given to the commander in chief from either party in at least six decades," according to CQ.

The next-highest was Senate Republicans' support for Bush in 2001 and 2003, at 94 percent.

Looking at it from another angle, House Republicans supported the president in 12 percent of votes in 2013. In terms of low support, this is second only to House Democrats' 7 percent support for Bush in 2007.

Compare this to the 1960s — before Congress started on a path of increasing polarization. Senate Democrats at one pointed voted for Democratic President Lyndon B. Johnson's policies 60 percent of the time, while Senate Republicans voted for them about 50 percent of the time.

With the election near, Republicans are using Democratic unity on congressional votes to their advantage, especially considering Obama's relatively low approval ratings — 40 percent, as of the latest Gallup poll.

Obama's particularly low numbers among Republicans can help rally base voters, while undecided voters could be swayed as well, said Benjamin Bates, an expert in political messaging at Ohio University.

"If you can make a voter think that a congressperson or senator votes in lockstep with the president, all of the negative feelings a voter might have toward the president might be transferred to the candidate," Bates said.

Attacks against Republicans for consistently voting with their party wouldn't work as well for Democrats in this cycle because voters might not see this as a negative, Bates said.

"Republicans are already perceived as voting in lockstep by many voters," Bates said. "Republican voters would probably see an attack ad that a candidate was voting too often with Republicans as a strength and not a criticism."

Bates added that while Republicans have Obama, Democrats don't have a major, polarizing Republican figure to whom they can compare candidates' records.

When a party holds the presidency, it holds political power. But when the president is unpopular, it gives the opposing party a talking point to run on.

Edited for print. Read the full fact-checks at PolitiFact.com.