By Jason Lange, Unknown f781ef79-b713-474d-aef1-1fc7112288ee and James Oliphant
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Most Americans believe that efforts to redraw U.S. House of Representatives districts to maximize partisan gains, like those under way in Texas and California, are bad for democracy, a new Reuters/Ipsos poll found.
More than half of respondents -- 57% -- said they feared that American democracy itself was in danger, a view held by eight in 10 Democrats and four in 10 in President Donald Trump's Republican
Party.
The six-day survey of 4,446 U.S. adults, which closed on Monday, showed deep unease with the growing political divisions in Washington -- where Republicans control both chambers of Congress -- and state capitals.
The poll found that 55% of respondents, including 71% of Democrats and 46% of Republicans, agreed that ongoing redistricting plans - such as those hatched by governors in Texas and California in a process known as gerrymandering - were "bad for democracy."
At Trump's urging, Republican Texas Governor Greg Abbott has called a special session of the state legislature to redraw the state’s congressional maps ahead of the 2026 midterm elections, aiming to help Republicans defend their 219-212 U.S. House majority.
Incumbent presidents' parties typically lose House seats in midterms, which can block their legislative agendas and in Trump's first term led to two impeachment probes.
California Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom, a White House hopeful in 2028, has threatened to try to redraw his state's district map in response, adding five Democratic seats to offset Republicans' expected Texas gains.
The practice is not new but has gained attention because it is happening mid-decade rather than following a census. It has meant that the vast majority of House races are not competitive in general elections; in recent decades about two-thirds of them were won by more than 20 percentage points.
As president, Trump has flouted democratic norms with steps including directing the U.S. Justice Department to pursue his political adversaries, pressuring the independent Federal Reserve to lower rates and seizing control of Washington, D.C.'s police force.
In interviews, Texas Republicans who participated in the poll largely supported the state’s potential redistricting, while Democrats described it as “cheating” but supported the idea of Democratic states trying to respond in kind.
The poll had a margin of error of about 2 percentage points when describing the views of all Americans and about 3 points for the views of Republicans and Democrats.
'SHADY BUSINESS'
Amanda Kelley, 51, an insurance fraud investigator in Dallas, was the rare Republican to criticize the Texas effort.
"I don't like it when either side tries to do that. I think that's shady business," Kelley said. "The optics of it happening in the middle of the term when you would draw district lines, that leaves kind of a bad taste in my mouth."
Paul Wehrmann, 57, an attorney in Dallas who described himself as an independent voter, also opposed it.
"It's unfair, and it sets a bad precedent," said Wehrmann, who worries it could spiral into states redrawing maps every election cycle instead of every decade. Partisan gerrymandering "is bad all around, but I think that it is fair for Democrats to try to counterbalance what Republicans are doing.
"They need to stop bringing a knife to a gunfight.”
Americans of both parties have long disliked elected leaders of the rival party, but the Reuters/Ipsos poll found that they also distrust regular people who align with the opposing party.
Some 55% of Democrats agreed with a statement that "people who are Republican are NOT to be trusted," while 32% disagreed. Republicans were split, with 43% agreeing that Democrats were untrustworthy and 44% saying they disagreed.
The poll also showed politics weighing more on people's everyday lives than in past years, particularly among Democrats. Some 27% of Democrats said last year's presidential election has negatively affected their friendships.
A Reuters/Ipsos poll in April 2017, early in Trump's first term, showed a smaller share of Democrats - 18% - reported fraying friendships because of the election. Only 10% of Republicans said this month that politics weighed on their friendships, largely unchanged from 2017.
Jeffrey Larson, a 64-year-old toxicologist and Republican voter in Seabrook, Texas, said he and his wife, a Democrat, agreed not to discuss politics.
“I might not agree with what the Democrats are doing, but I don’t think that they’re trying to specifically destroy my life or destroy America,” Larson said.
Close to half of Democrats - or 46% - said their party had lost its way, compared to 19% of Republicans who said the same of their party.
Sandy Ogden, 71, a tech executive from Sunnyvale, California and self-described Democrat, said she faulted her party's leaders.
“I think the Democratic Party members are united in what we believe, but the leaders are ineffective in mounting an opposition that works,” Ogden said.
Analysts said that ordinary Democrats' greater mistrust of Republicans and friction with friends suggests a reluctance among Democrats to engage with Republicans that could harm the party's chances at regaining political standing.
“Democracy involves a willingness to allow people with differing views to express those views,” said Whit Ayres, a veteran Republican pollster.
Michael Ceraso, a longtime Democratic operative, found the poll results frustrating.
"The majority of Democrats believe our democracy is failing and nearly half of them don’t want to talk to the opposition party," Ceraso said. "We have to be better."
(Reporting by Jason Lange, Nolan D. McCaskill and James Oliphant; Editing by Scott Malone and Cynthia Osterman)
