A poll of conservative voters conducted this week by ConservativeHome indicates broad support for spending cuts and a higher degree of confidence in newly-elected Republican congressmen than in returning ones.
ConservativeHome is an organization dedicated to covering “the ongoing debate about the future of the Republican party and conservatism in America.” 820 conservative voters were identified by research group YouGov for the survey.
One result indicates a wide degree of support for comprehensive cuts to spending. When offered several choices for deficit-reduction preferences, 56 percent selected “spending cuts across the board” while 27 percent selected “cut spending from all government budgets except the military.” This result may hint at a significant development for conservative voters as reducing military spending is often regarded as a last resort.
Other options presented to participants for deficit-reduction included “pass a balanced budget amendment,” which received 10 percent support, “cut taxes” with 3 percent support, and “fix Social Security and Medicare” with 3 percent. Two options unsurprisingly received only one percent support: “raise taxes on the wealthy” and “cut spending primarily from the defense budget.”
Participants responded with guarded optimism when asked about their confidence that incoming Republican congressmen would stay true to their election pledges. Forty-five percent were somewhat confident that the majority of them would and 18 percent very confident. Only 10 percent were fairly certain that the incoming congressmen would break their word.
When asked whether returning Republican congressmen would make a genuine effort to reduce spending, 42 percent were somewhat confident they would, 37 percent not particularly confident, and 12 percent not at all confident. Only 8 percent were very confident that they would work hard to reduce spending.