What They Told Us: Reviewing Last Week’s Key Polls - Week Ending July 14, 2018

It has been a rancorous political week with Democrats apoplectic over President Trump’s U.S. Supreme Court nomination, his frank comments to U.S. allies over defense spending and trade, and in the House of Representatives where committees interviewed demoted FBI official Peter Strzok about bias against the Trump Campaign in the 2016 election.  

Even before President Trump announced his nomination Monday of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to replace retiring U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, Democrats were vowing to stop any Trump nominee. But most voters still believe that every judicial nomination made by a president is entitled to a deciding vote by the U.S. Senate.

Voters strongly suspect that Kavanaugh will be the next member of the U.S. Supreme Court, but they are not as supportive of him as they were of President Trump’s first choice for the high court.

Trump arrived in Brussels Tuesday for this year’s NATO summit meeting. At the top of Trump’s agenda is getting NATO allies to pay more for defense spending. Voters continue to say that the United States should not be the world’s policeman, and fewer see the need for the organization’s existence. 

Britain was Trump’s second stop in a week of travel.  Despite the turmoil as two senior cabinet members to Prime Minister Theresa May resigned with just 100 days until the so-called Brexit deal is supposed to be done, most on this side of the pond think the ouster is still a go.

Conduct of demoted FBI official Peter Strzok’s sworn testimony before a joint session of the House Judiciary & Oversight and Government Reform committees clearly illustrated the anger that continues to run high on both sides of the Trump divide. But Democrats are a bit hotter under the collar now than they were a year ago.

Meanwhile, Democrats have lengthened their lead on the latest Rasmussen Reports Generic Congressional Ballot.

Otherwise, in an economic issue that still sharply divides Democrats and Republicans, fewer Americans these days think the government is spending too much money on welfare programs.

To combat poverty, a California city has launched a pilot program in which some residents will receive $500 per month with no strings attached. But nearly half of Americans wouldn’t welcome such a program in their area.

Focusing more tightly on the bottom line, Americans are leery that most human jobs will be replaced by artificial intelligence in the future.

Americans also have mixed feelings about affirmative action programs in general, but most agree with the Trump administration’s decision to reverse Obama era policies that made race a deciding factor in college admissions.

In other surveys last week:

-- The latest Rasmussen Minute looks at growing Democratic demands for the abolition of the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency. Most voters think getting rid of ICE is a bad idea. 

-- I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream—preferably chocolate, butter pecan or vanilla, and in the comforts of home.

-- Thirty-nine percent (39%) of Likely U.S. Voters now think the country is heading in the right direction.

Visit the Rasmussen Reports home page for the latest current polling coverage of events in the news. The page is updated several times each day.

Remember, if it's in the news, it's in our polls.