Nearly half Americans identify as Republicans

The share of Americans who say they’re Republican has risen to the highest level in 30 years, posing a stark challenge for Joe Biden.

The share of Americans who identify as Republicans has risen to the highest level in 30 years, posing a stark challenge for Joe Biden and the ruling Democrats as the president prepares to give his second – and much anticipated – solo press conference.

The proportion of US voters who said they were Republican or “leaned Republican” jumped 7 percentage points between the start and end of last year to 47 per cent, in what was one of the largest ever turnarounds in the fortunes of America’s two major political parties on record, according to Gallup.

“Republicans had a larger advantage only in the first quarter of 1991, after the US victory in the Persian Gulf War led by then-President George H.W. Bush,” Gallup, one of America’s oldest polling firms, said in a statement.

The share who identified as Democrats meanwhile dropped by 7 percentage points to 42 per cent over the same period, according to the poll of around 12,000 randomly selected American voters.

“The Republicans last held a five-point advantage in party identification and leaning in early 1995, after winning control of the House of Representatives for the first time since the 1950s,” Gallup added.

The poll came after a horror week for the Democrats, in which inflation reached a new high of 7 per cent, the president’s voting rights speech was widely panned, the supreme court blocked a national vaccine mandate, and Mr Biden’s popularity sank to new low of 33 per cent according to one well known poll.

One of several that have recently painted the Democrats’ performance in 2021 in a poor light, the Gallup poll will be an awkward backdrop for Joe Biden’s White House press conference on Wednesday afternoon, which follows months of complaints by media about a lack of access.

The President has given fewer news conferences and media interviews than any of his five predecessors, according to Associated Press analysis.

Wednesday’s event will see the president grilled on what appears to be a disintegrating legislative agenda, rising inflation, the administration’s response to Covid-19 and the possibility of war between Russia and Ukraine.

The president’s mental fitness has also come under fresh scrutiny, following a press briefing last week in which the president appeared tired and confused, allegations his White House minders had deliberately limited the Mr Biden’s unscripted interactions.

Gallup pollsters put the Republican party’s rising appeal down to the president’s unpopularity, rising inflation, fresh waves of Covid-19, former President Trump’s fading legacy, and a perception the withdrawal from Afghanistan was bungled.

The poll asked respondents whether they considered themselves, Republicans, Democrats or independents, and if the latter, which way they were currently leaning, without mentioning the names of any particular political figure.

“The general stability for the full-year average obscures a dramatic shift over the course of 2021, from a nine-percentage-point Democratic advantage in the first quarter to a rare five-point Republican edge in the fourth quarter,” Gallup said.

The biggest shifts were detected among nominally “independent” voters, suggesting the “rusted on” proportions of voted hadn’t changed significantly, a trend reflected in other national polls that show a large drop in support for President Biden among independents.

Democrats will defend a slim majority in the House of Representatives and Senate in congressional elections schedule in November, widely expected to see Republicans re-take control of the lower and potentially the upper house as well.