GND COCE Final Manuscript

How Bipartisan Support for the Green New Deal Disappeared in Four Months

Abel Gustafson Yale Program on Climate Change Communication ~ [email protected]

Seth A. Rosenthal Yale Program on Climate Change Communication ~ [email protected]

Parrish Bergquist Yale Program on Climate Change Communication ~ [email protected]

Matthew T. Ballew Yale Program on Climate Change Communication ~ [email protected]

Matthew H. Goldberg Yale Program on Climate Change Communication ~ [email protected]

John E. Kotcher George Mason University Center for Climate Change Communication ~ [email protected]

Anthony Leiserowitz Yale Program on Climate Change Communication ~ [email protected]

Edward W. Maibach George Mason University Center for Climate Change Communication ~ [email protected]

Abstract

The Green New Deal’s rapid rise from obscurity to prominence enabled us to measure naturally- occurring partisan polarization unfolding over time at a national level, as well as explore evidence for a possible causal mechanism. Here, we report findings from a sequence of two nationally-representative surveys of registered American voters that measured familiarity with and support for the Green New Deal (GND) shortly before and shortly after the issue entered the national spotlight. We find that the Time 1 to Time 2 increase in awareness of the GND was largest among conservative Republicans compared to other political segments. Compared to liberal Democrats, about twice as many conservative Republicans had heard “a lot” about the GND at Time 2. Among Republicans, higher familiarity at Time 2 is strongly associated with lower support. We also present evidence of a likely mechanism: a negative “Fox News Effect” among Republicans. The data indicate that Fox News viewing is a significant predictor of familiarity with the GND and of opposition to it, when controlling for likely alternate explanations. The negative effect of Fox News viewing on Republicans’ support is significantly stronger than the positive effect of MSNBC viewing on Democrats’ support.

How Bipartisan Support for the Green New Deal Disappeared in Four Months

Climate change requires sustainability solutions that match the scale of the threat. In late 2018, one such large-scale solution entered the American political arena as a proposed set of policies called “The Green New Deal” (GND), propelled by a wave of grassroots activism and Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY). The policy framework of the GND is expansive, including but not limited to a transition to 100% clean, renewable electricity, “green” jobs and job-training guarantees, improvements in the sustainability of buildings and transportation infrastructure, clean air and water guarantees, and investments in “green” technology research and development (H.R. 109).

In democratic societies, public opinion is a central determinant of the success of public policy. Many of the individual policy components of the GND had bipartisan support in 2018, such as a transition to 100% renewable energy and regulating CO2 as a pollutant (Ansolabehere & Konisky, 2014; Carlock, Mangan, & McElwee, 2018; Leiserowitz et al., 2018; 2019). However, public opinion on an unfamiliar issue (such as the GND) could become politically polarized if the public is exposed to cues that associate support or opposition with their respective partisan loyalties or ideological values (Bartells, 2002; Druckman, Peterson, & Slothuus, 2013; Taber & Lodge, 2006; Zaller, 1992). Some experiments have demonstrated “party over policy” effects such that people tend to favor a policy proposed by their own political party but reject the same policy if proposed by an opposing party (e.g., Cohen, 2003; Van Boven, Ehret, & Sherman, 2018). These experiments have demonstrated the ability to increase polarization by inducing partisan cues in artificial settings, and most surveys on media effects observe single time points. The present study observes these phenomena occurring in the real world with robust estimates of the national-level effects.

The GND’s rapid rise from obscurity to prominence presented a natural-occurring opportunity to observe these effects. Therefore, we measured familiarity with and support for the GND in a nationally- representative survey of Americans in early December of 2018 (T1). At that time, the GND did not have yet widespread name recognition in the general public, and partisan framing by political and media elites had not yet permeated the national conversation. Then we repeated the same questions in a second nationally-representative survey in early April 2019 (T2) – four months after the initial measurement.

Between these two time points, the GND was publicized extensively by various national media – including coverage of its grassroots activism, its intra- and inter-partisan controversies, its evolving policy framework, and of Rep. Ocasio-Cortez herself. For example, in the week following the February 7th release of the GND resolution, CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News alone combined for 45 primetime segments discussing the GND (MacDonald, 2019a). In the week preceding the March 26th Senate vote on the GND resolution, those three news outlets combined for 41 primetime segments (MacDonald, 2019b).

Here, we report findings from a sequence of two nationally-representative surveys of registered American voters (N1 = 966; N2 = 1,097) measuring public familiarity with and support for the GND shortly before and shortly after the issue entered popular political discourse (from November 28 to December 11, 2018 and from March 29 to April 9, 2019). Our findings describe the dramatic changes that occurred over four months at a national level. We also report how these changes varied significantly by political subgroups, and we present evidence of likely mechanism: a strong negative

“Fox News Effect” on Republicans’ support for the GND that persists after controlling for ideology, general news exposure, voting behavior, and education.

Methods

Sample and Data

For each survey, the sample was obtained from GfK’s KnowledgePanel®, a nationally representative panel of U.S. adults (18+) drawn using probability sampling. KnowledgePanel members are recruited using a combination of methods including random digit dialing and address-based sampling that cover all U.S. residential phone numbers and addresses. All questionnaires were self-administered by respondents in a web-based environment. Those who wish to join the panel but do not have internet access are loaned computers and Internet access to enable participation. Dates of data collection for T1 were November 28 to December 11, 2018 and for T2 were from March 29 to April 9, 2019. This study uses only the registered voters (2018 N = 966; 2019 N = 1,097) from the full samples (2018 N = 1,114; 2019 N = 1,291).

Measures

Political party. Respondents were asked an initial question of “Generally speaking, do you think of yourself as a…” with response options of “Republican,” “Democrat,” “Independent,” “Other,” and “No party/not interested in politics.” Those who responded “Independent” or “Other” were presented a follow-up question asking “Do you think of yourself as closer to the…” with response options of “Republican party,” “Democratic party,” and “Neither.” The registered voters that responded “Republican party” and “Democratic party” to the follow-up question were combined with those initially responding “Republican” and “Democrat,” respectively, to form the total Republican and Democrat groups used for analysis (2018 Democrats n = 466, 2018 Republicans n = 356; 2019 Democrats n = 475, 2019 Republicans n = 488). Political ideology. Political ideology was measured with a question asking “In general, do you think of yourself as…” with response options on a five-item scale of “Very liberal” (1), “Somewhat liberal” (2) “Moderate, middle of the road” (3), “Somewhat conservative” (4), and “Very conservative” (5).

Political segments. For simplicity, Figures 1-2 combine the party and ideology variables to create four distinct groups: liberal Democrats (2018 n = 295; 2019 n = 264), moderate/conservative Democrats (2018 n = 168; 2019 n = 209), moderate/liberal Republicans (2018 n = 116; 2019 n = 165), and conservative Republicans (2018 n = 238; 2019 n = 320).

Frequency of news media consumption. Respondents were asked “How often do you watch, listen to, or read content from the following?” with separate items of “The Fox News CABLE Channel,” “MSNBC,” “CNN,” “Local TV news,” “Your local newspaper (either in print or online)” and “The national nightly network news on CBS, ABC or NBC.” Response options were “Never” (1), “Every few weeks” (2), “Once a week” (3), “Every few days” (4), “Almost every day” (5), “Several times a day” (6), and “Many times a day” (7).

Responses on the CNN, local TV news, local newspaper, and national nightly network news items were combined to form an index of frequency of mainstream news consumption (α = .66). Responses to the Fox News and MSNBC items were used to construct binary variables (0 = once per week or less; 1 =

Presented at Waterlines: Confluence and Hope through Environmental Communication The Conference on Communication and Environment, Vancouver, Canada, June 17-21, 2019 https://theieca.org/coce2019 Page 4 of 12 more than once per week) for some frequency plots and the binary logistic regressions, and were kept as continuous variables for other regression analyses.

The cell sizes of Figure 4 are as follows: Of Republican registered voters, 38% (2018 n = 149; 2019 n =188) watch, read, or listen to Fox News more than once per week and 61% (2018 n = 202; 2019 n = 296) consume it once per week or less. Of Democrat registered voters, 27% (2018 n = 147; 2019 n = 134) watch, read, or listen to MSNBC more than once per week and 73% (2018 n = 311; 2019 n = 334) consume it once per week or less.

Education. Respondents’ reported highest level of educational attainment was recoded to a six-point scale of “less than H.S.,” “H.S. diploma or GED,” “some college or Associate’s degree,” “Bachelor’s degree,” “Master’s degree,” and “Doctorate or professional degree.”

Familiarity with the GND. Respondents were asked “How much, if anything, have you heard about a policy being proposed by some members of Congress called the ‘Green New Deal?’” Response options were “Nothing at all,” “A little,” and “A lot.” For Figure 3 (which uses T2 only), the Republican and Democrat cell sizes are as follows: “Nothing at all” (R n = 161, D n = 190), “A little” (R n = 150, D n = 211), “A lot” (R n = 177, D n = 73). When summed for the binary familiarity variable (Table 1), 327 Republican and 284 Democrat registered voters had heard either “a little” or “a lot” about the GND at T2.

Support for the GND. After responding to the GND familiarity measure, respondents were presented with the following text description of the GND:

“Some members of Congress are proposing a “Green New Deal” for the U.S. They say that a Green New Deal will produce jobs and strengthen America’s economy by accelerating the transition from fossil fuels to clean, renewable energy. The “Deal” would generate 100% of the nation’s electricity from clean, renewable sources within the next 10 years, upgrade the nation’s energy grid, buildings and transportation infrastructure, increase energy efficiency, invest in “green” technology research and development, and provide training for jobs in the new “green” economy.”

Then respondents were asked “How much do you support or oppose this idea?” Responses were given on a four-point scale of “Strongly oppose” (1), “Somewhat oppose” (2), “Somewhat support” (3), and “Strongly support” (4).

Analyses and Interpretation

The data were weighted to match U.S. Census parameters, and these weights were applied in all descriptive and statistical analyses used in this study. For frequency values (e.g., Figure 1), sums and differences between proportions (e.g., “strongly support” + “somewhat support” or, alternatively, change from Time 1 to Time 2) are rounded after the value is calculated (e.g., 15.3% + 15.3% = 30.6%, which, after rounding would appear in a chart as 15% + 15% = 31%).

Results Increases in Awareness of the Green New Deal

In December 2018 (T1), 82% of registered voters had heard “nothing at all” about the Green New Deal (14% “a little”; 3% “a lot”). By April 2019 (T2), the proportion who had heard “nothing at all” had decreased by half to 41% (36 % “a little”; 22% “a lot”). The proportion of registered voters who have heard at least something about the GND more than tripled from 17% to 59%. This increase of 41 percentage points extrapolates to an estimate that around 63 million of the United States’ 153 million registered voters (U.S. Census Bureau, 2019) became aware of the GND in those four months.

Although the GND is a progressive policy proposed by liberal Democrats, it was conservative Republicans who increased more in familiarity than other political segments (Figure 1, left). Compared to liberal Democrats (17%), around twice as many conservative Republicans (38%) had heard “a lot” about the GND at T2 (Figure 1, right). Both political extremes – liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans – have now heard more about the GND than their moderate counterparts.

Figure 1. The proportion of registered voters have heard about the Green New Deal, by political segments. Note: Question: “How much, if anything, have you heard about a policy proposed by some members of Congress called the Green New Deal?” Response options: “Nothing at all,” “A little,” “A lot.”

Increased Polarization in Support for the Green New Deal

In both surveys, we described the basic aspirations of the GND to respondents and then asked how much they support or oppose this idea. At T1, 81% of registered voters – including 64% of Republicans – said they support this policy idea. Given the respondents’ unfamiliarity with the GND’s political associations, most of the T1 respondents were largely basing their support or opposition on the GND’s

Presented at Waterlines: Confluence and Hope through Environmental Communication The Conference on Communication and Environment, Vancouver, Canada, June 17-21, 2019 https://theieca.org/coce2019 Page 6 of 12 policy framework itself. The observed T1 bipartisan support is not surprising because other research has found strong public support for some of its major stated components such as a clean energy transition (Ansolabehere & Konisky, 2014; Carlock, Mangan, & McElwee, 2018; Leiserowitz et al., 2019).

Unlike T1 respondents, T2 respondents entered the survey after living amidst frequent and opinionated national media coverage of the GND for the past four months, such that T2 respondents were, in the aggregate, exposed to information and interpretations that respondents had not. That is, public support or opposition at T2 was not only informed by the stated content of the GND policy framework but also by information and opinions that the public was exposed to between T1 and T2.

The T2 data indicate significant decreases in support among Republicans – but not Democrats – resulting in a substantial increase in polarization (Figure 2, left). Conservative Republicans increased most in awareness relative to other political segments (+59 percentage points; Figure 2, right), while also decreasing most in support (-25 points).

Figure 2. Changes in support for the Green New Deal, by political segments. Note: Question (after description): “How much do you support or oppose this idea?” Support is the % responding either “Strongly support” or “Somewhat support.” Awareness is the % responding either heard “a little” or “a lot.”

In addition to Republican familiarity corresponding with decreased Republican support at the aggregate level over time, it is also the case that individual Republicans who are more familiar with the GND are the least likely to support it. In a striking interaction effect, the T2 data indicate that only 4% of Republicans who have heard” “a lot” about the GND support it, whereas there is support from 85% of Republicans who have heard “nothing at all.” The proportion of support among those who have previously heard “nothing at all” does not differ substantially between Democrats and Republicans.

However, the two parties do differ among those who have previously heard “a little” and – do an even greater degree – “a lot” about the GND (Figure 3).

Figure 3. Proportion of Democrats and Republicans that support the Green New Deal, by how much they have heard about it. Note: T2 registered voters only. Support (y-value) is the % responding either “strongly support” or “somewhat support.”

Evidence of Partisan Media Effects

Many scholars have argued that the agenda-setting, priming, and framing patterns of the media affect public awareness and opinions of issues (Iyengar & Kinder, 1987) particularly when a distinctive message is targeted to an amenable audience segment (Bartells, 1993; Zaller, 1992; 1996). Fox News differs from other national news outlets like CNN and MSNBC such that their media coverage of climate change topics is more critical and dismissive of the science and solutions (e.g., Hart, 2008; Feldman, Maibach, Roser-Renouf, & Leiserowitz, 2012). The result has been termed the “Fox News Effect,” is a driving force of political polarization on climate change (Feldman et al., 2012). Frequency of Fox News consumption predicts disagreement with scientists about global warming existence, causes, and effects (Krosnick & MacInnis, 2010), even when controlling for demographics, ideological views, and frequency of general news exposure (Feldman et al., 2012).

In the specific case of the GND, it is reasonable to expect a similar “Fox News Effect” because of the high density of Fox News’ GND coverage between T1 and T2. For example, in the week after H.R 109 as well as in the week preceding the GND Senate vote, Fox News ran more primetime segments

Presented at Waterlines: Confluence and Hope through Environmental Communication The Conference on Communication and Environment, Vancouver, Canada, June 17-21, 2019 https://theieca.org/coce2019 Page 8 of 12 covering the GND than both CNN and MSNBC combined (MacDonald, 2019a; 2019b). These Fox News segments often described the GND in an erroneous and disparaging fashion. For example, primetime host Sean Hannity falsely claimed the GND sought to ban airplanes, nuclear energy, and steak (MacDonald, 2019a).

Republicans who watch Fox News frequently (+64 points) increased more in familiarity with the GND than those who watch infrequently (+43 points). A similar effect is observed for Democrats and MSNBC consumption (Figure 4). For Republicans who watch Fox News frequently, the T1-T2 decrease in support was twice as large (-32 points) as the decrease among Republicans who watch infrequently (- 15 points). In contrast, Democrats’ high levels of support do not differ substantially between T1 and T2, or between levels of MSNBC exposure (Figure 4).

Figure 4. Republicans’ changes in awareness and support by frequency of Fox News exposure, and Democrats’ changes by MSNBC exposure. Note: Registered voters only.

As evidence of a causal “Fox News Effect,” these correlational analyses demonstrate only two of the three necessary conditions of causality (covariation and temporal precedence) but not the third (ruling out alternative explanations). That is, the observed effect may be explained by other variables correlated with Fox News viewing (for Republicans) or MSNBC viewing (for Democrats) such as political ideology, political engagement, and frequency of consumption of news media in general (rather than Fox News or MSNBC specifically). For example, it may be that frequent Fox News viewers are more conservative and watch more news overall, and these variables – their more extreme political ideology and quantity of general news consumption (not Fox News consumption itself) – can explain all of the apparent differences between them and infrequent Fox News viewers.

In order to increase our confidence in the “Fox News Effect,” we must rule out some of these alternative explanations. To that end, we assessed the degree to which frequency of partisan media exposure predicts GND familiarity and support while controlling for likely alternative explanations of political ideology, voting behavior, general news consumption, and education. When controlling for these, a binary logistic regression found that T2 Republican registered voters who consume Fox News (in particular) more than once per week have 312% greater odds of having heard about the GND than those who consume Fox News once per week or less (Table 1). Similarly, when accounting for those covariates, T2 Democratic registered voters who consume MSNBC more than once per week have 371% greater odds of having heard about the GND than those who consume MSNBC once per week or less. These findings indicate that frequent Fox News consumption predicts familiarity with the GND among Republicans in the same direction and around the same magnitude that frequent MSNBC consumption predicts familiarity with the GND among Democrats (Table 1).

Table 1

Predicting the likelihood of familiarity with the GND.

Predictors B S.E. Sig. Exp(B) Prob. Republicans Frqnt. Fox News (0/1) 1.550 .265 .000 4.710 82% Lib./Conservative (5pt) .396 .126 .002 1.485 2016 Voter (0/1) -.161 .363 .658 0.852 Mainstream News (7pt) -.327 .100 .001 0.721 Education (6pt) .201 .097 .039 1.222 Democrats Frqnt. MSNBC (0/1) 1.415 .289 .000 4.116 80% Lib./Conservative (5pt) -.672 .126 .000 0.511 2016 Voter (0/1) -.160 .381 .675 0.852 Mainstream News (7pt) -.036 .088 .687 0.965 Education (6pt) .413 .086 .000 1.340 Note: T2 Republican and Democrat registered voters only. Outcome variable is GND familiarity coded as 0 = “nothing at all,” 1 = “a little” or “a lot.” Frqnt. Fox News coded as 0 = once per week or less, 1 = more than once per week.

Prob. = probability that a Republican/Democrat registered voter who watches Fox News / MSNBC more than once per week will have heard either “a little” or “a lot” about the GND, when controlling for the other predictors. Variables are unstandardized.

However, exposure to these partisan media outlets predicts support for the GND differently for Republicans and Democrats – in direction and in magnitude. Table 2 reports that when controlling for the alternative explanatory variables, Republicans have a strong negative relationship between frequency of Fox News consumption and support for the GND (b = -.370). Among Democrats, when including the same predictors, MSNBC consumption is weak but significant predictor of GND support (b = .118).

Table 2

Predicting support for the GND.

Predictors Adj. R2 b S.E. Sig. Republicans .227 Fox News (7 pt) -.370 .045 .000 Lib./Conservative (5pt) -.262 .044 .000 2016 Voter (0/1) -.022 .042 .610 Mainstream News (7pt) .132 .044 .003 Education (6pt) -.029 .042 .494 Democrats .103 MSNBC (7pt) .118 .052 .023 Lib./Conservative (5pt) -.276 .045 .000 2016 Voter (0/1) .019 .043 .665 Mainstream News (7pt) -.081 .052 .120 Education (6pt) .052 .045 .248 Note: T2 Republican and Democrat registered voters only. Outcome variable is GND support from 1 (“Strongly oppose”) to 4 (“Strongly support”). Fox News and MSNBC consumption from 1 (“Never”) to 7 (“Many times per day”). Adj. R2 = adjusted r-squared. All predictors are standardized.

These analyses add additional confidence to our interpretation of these data as reflecting the influence of partisan media on T2 respondents’ familiarity with and support for the GND. Specifically, they strengthen the third necessary condition for causality by eliminating some alternative causes, such that even when accounting for other likely explanatory variables, Republicans’ frequency of exposure to Fox News predicts familiarity with and support for the GND. The effect of Fox News consumption on GND support among Republicans is significantly larger than the effect of MSNBC consumption on GND support among Democrats (Z = 3.66, p < .001).

Conclusion

This study reports a robust quantification of the dramatic change in political polarization on the Green New Deal that developed at a national level between December 2018 and April 2019, as well as

Presented at Waterlines: Confluence and Hope through Environmental Communication The Conference on Communication and Environment, Vancouver, Canada, June 17-21, 2019 https://theieca.org/coce2019 Page 11 of 12 evidence suggesting a likely mechanism: a Fox News Effect. In four months, both Democrats and Republicans increased dramatically in familiarity with the GND, with frequent partisan media viewers increasing more than infrequent viewers. For both Republicans and Democrats, T2 familiarity is predicted by frequency of partisan media consumption, controlling for ideology, education, and general engagement variables. However, as Republicans became more familiar with the GND, they became much more opposed to it. The T2 data suggest a Fox News Effect among Republicans such that more frequent consumption of Fox News leads to greater opposition to the GND, when controlling for likely alternate explanations.

However, these conclusions and interpretations must be guided by some limitations. First, while the publics’ overwhelming unfamiliarity with the GND at T1 creates a valuable near-zero baseline, it has a collateral effect of increasing the importance of the GND description given to respondents. The T1 survey was the first nationally-representative analysis of public awareness and support for the “Green New Deal” specifically. Thus, we crafted the description was crafted to mirror the policy framework available at T1 (which was still accurate as of T2). However, the description did not mention the estimated costs or potential risks of the GND, as such information was not available at T1. It is important to note that other polling using different descriptions of the GND would likely find different levels of total support – particularly among those respondents who have still heard “nothing at all” about the GND.

Second, there are innumerable possible “third” variables (beyond the three likely alternative explanations that we control for) that could potentially explain the “Fox News Effect.” Fully eliminating this barrier to claiming causality requires an experimental design. However, it was not feasible to create controlled experimental conditions of actual exposure to national-level partisan media coverage of a new real-world climate policy. Instead, we procured representative data before and after the advent of the GND so as to observe how naturally-occurring changes that developed over four months at the national level varied by partisan media exposure when controlling for alternate explanations. Thus, causality cannot be truly inferred from these data.

In sum, this study provides a vivid and robust example of the development of political polarization on major climate policy, and highlights the potential effects of partisan media on opinion polarization while the public is becoming aware of a new issue. It also evidences a possible party-over-policy effect such that Republicans support the components of the GND in principle but come to reject the policy when they learn of its partisan affiliations. Further investigations of which components of climate and energy policies have strong support among Republicans and conservatives will be helpful for policymakers and advocates who seek bipartisan solutions. Additionally, future research testing messaging strategies for climate and energy policy may lead to discoveries that can help future public policy proposals avoid the dramatic polarization effects observed in the case of the Green New Deal.

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Presented at Waterlines: Confluence and Hope through Environmental Communication The Conference on Communication and Environment, Vancouver, Canada, June 17-21, 2019 https://theieca.org/coce2019