Welcome back to the Data for Progress newsletter, your update on our research, blog posts, and memes.

Iowa Voters Support the Progressive Agenda
The Iowa Caucuses are less than a week away, and Iowa voters are ready for progressive change. We’ve released new state-level polling showing that likely Iowa Democratic presidential caucus-goers support progressive policies and new processes to implement them.

More than three-quarters of respondents supported Medicare for All (78 percent), the Green New Deal (83 percent), allowing the federal government to negotiate pharma prices (85 percent), and the government production of insulin (86 percent).



Iowa Democrats also support process reforms to help attain these policies, although not as significantly as the policies themselves. 59 percent want to expand the Supreme Court, and a plurality — 45 percent to 29 percent — support ending the filibuster, although more than a quarter of respondents said they didn’t know their stance on that issue.


Sean’s NYT Op-Ed: How Democrats Can Win Back Obama-Trump Defectors
Earlier this month, the New York Times published an op-ed that our director Sean McElwee wrote with Tufts University professor Brian Schaffner, including a brand new data analysis of Obama-Trump voters — the voters who very well may decide who wins the 2020 election.

Using data from the Cooperative Congressional Election Study, the article shows that overall, the Obama-Trump voters who voted for a Democratic House member in 2018 look a lot like the Democratic base. 84 percent want to ban assault rifles, 83 percent support Medicare for All, and 73 percent oppose Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris Climate Agreement.



Even the Obama-Trump voters who voted Republican for House in 2018 (which represent three-quarters of Obama-Trump voters who voted in the Midterms) are progressive on multiple issues, with a majority supporting an assault weapons ban, Medicare for All, and DACA. That said, Obama-Trump voters took a more conservative position on the border wall, feminism, and acknowledgement that white Americans have advantages.

"Though there is a temptation to focus on Mr. Trump’s personality, if Democrats continue to learn from these elections, they will focus this year’s campaign on their plans to address issues like health care, wages and the environment, lest the Obama-Trump voters become Obama-Trump-Trump voters in 2020,” Sean wrote.


Green New Deal Scorecard: Frontrunner Comparison
As Biden, Sanders, and Warren have emerged as the top three candidates in the Democratic primary, we wanted to directly compare the comprehensiveness of their climate plans. While we believe reasonable people can disagree on the appropriate policy design or theory of political change, we strongly value how thorough their plans are — how well they meet our 48 Green New Deal criteria.

In our frontrunner comparison, we find that Sanders’ plan is the most comprehensive, satisfying 45 of our criteria, followed by Warren with 41. Biden comes in well behind them with 30.5.



Interestingly, Warren’s original plan would have actually been classified as “incomplete” by our standards. However, after releasing a total of ten plans, she’s joined Sanders in the “very thorough” range.




Regenerative Farming and the Green New Deal
In one of our latest memos, we addressed an often overlooked aspect of the Green New Deal: its effect on farms. 

Research has found that proper soil management could sequester 10 percent of emissions within 25 years. However, we’re currently moving in the opposite direction. We’re losing topsoil at 10 to 100 times the natural replacement rate, and soil erosion is costing Americans an estimated $44 billion every year.

Our memo identified the top two contributors to poor soil health: policies that incentivize monoculture farms over diversified farms and a lack of training and support for farmers who want to engage in healthy ecological practices. Based on this, we argue that the government should reduce and eventually eliminate incentives for monocultural farming systems and transition farm program funding from commodity crops to diversified, regenerative operations through a Whole-Farm Net Revenue Insurance program.


Memo: Ending the Insulin Crisis with the Affordable Drug Manufacturing Act
7 million Americans need insulin every day. But with the cost of a vial of insulin tripling over the past two decades, one quarter of diabetes-center patients are rationing their insulin, according to a Yale University study.

The three Fortune 500 companies that manufacture 97 percent of insulin in the U.S. — Sanofi, Novo Nordisk, and Eli Lilly — will stop at nothing to prevent progressive pharmaceutical policies like the Affordable Drug Manufacturing Act from passing. But in a new memo, we show that even when presented with Republican talking points, Americans are strongly supportive of the ADMA’s provision for the government to manufacture insulin at a lower cost.

After providing a background on the history of insulin production and an overview of the ADMA, our memo includes polling data showing that voters support allowing the government to manufacture insulin by a 48-33 margin — even after hearing a Republican argument and no Democratic argument.




Memo: New York Polling
In a new memo, our polling demonstrates that New York voters are progressive across the board. An overwhelming 76 percent support a 2 percent tax on billionaires and 68 percent support a carbon tax, each with less than 20 percent of New Yorkers in opposition.



Here are some other polling nuggets: 

• If the New York Democratic primary were held tomorrow, 30 percent of Democratic voters would choose Joe Biden, 17 percent would support Bernie Sanders and Michael Bloomberg, and 14 percent would pick Elizabeth Warren. 

• New York voters would rather increase taxes on the wealthy than cut services by a whopping 76-16 margin.

• 59 percent support automatic voter registration, while 22 percent oppose.

• A plurality of voters — 44 percent support, 31 percent opposition — would support preventing ICE from entering the courthouse.

• The Green New Deal, Medicare for All, and a Homes Guarantee all have net support of at least 35 percent.

Here’s Where Congressional Candidates Stand on the Progressive Labor Agenda
In one of our latest blog posts, we analyzed the labor proposals of 32 primary challengers to Democratic incumbents and found that these challengers were overwhelmingly supportive of the progressive labor agenda.



Every respondent was supportive of the Raise the Wage Act, LGBTQ employment protections, the PRO Act, federal legislation expanding public sector bargaining, the federal right to strike, fair scheduling, and a federal “just cause” standard abolishing at-will employment.

The incumbents they’re running against? Not so much. Most failed to respond, some in a quite telling fashion:




Data Bytes

• South Carolina Democrats Support the Progressive Agenda: With South Carolina Democratic primary polls showing Joe Biden firmly in the lead, some may assume that South Carolina Democrats hold more moderate policy positions. But on two issues we tested — adding seats to the Supreme Court and the Green New Deal — they’re anything but.
  
  61 percent of South Carolina Democratic voters said they’d support having the next Democratic president add seats to the Supreme Court, while just 25 percent opposed. Furthermore, 83 percent said that they’d be more likely to support a candidate if they backed the Green New Deal, while just 6 percent said they’d be more likely to oppose that candidate.
   

• Voters Oppose Automatically Enrolling the Uninsured in a Government Option: According to the Washington Post, Pete Buttigieg’s healthcare plan would automatically enroll uninsured individuals into a healthcare plan — a “‘supercharged’ version of [the] unpopular Obamacare mandate.” Unlike Medicare for All, however, Buttigieg’s plan would add the premiums to the tax bills of uninsured Americans.
  
  Our polling finds that this aspect of Mayor Pete’s plan is unpopular. Only 36 percent of Americans said they’d support a policy to automatically enroll uninsured Americans into a public option and add the cost to their tax bill, while 44 percent opposed.
  
  
  
   

• The Public Doesn’t Want To Means-Test Public Education: Our polling finds that the public is strongly opposed to means-testing public education by a 59-27 margin.
  
  However, when you look at the crosstabs, a peculiar pattern emerges. People who identify as socialists are significantly more likely to support means-testing public education than self-described capitalists. Likewise, Democrats are more likely to support means-testing that Republicans.
  
  
  
  The reason for this is likely because our question — which asked respondents, “would you [support or oppose] requiring families earning more than $500,000 to pay for tuition to public high schools?” — may have led left-leaning respondents to view means-testing as a progressive way to penalize the rich. This is essentially the argument against universal free college that Buttigieg has made on the campaign trail, and it seems to be striking a chord with some progressives.
  
  Of course, as Ethan Winter explains in our blog post, universal programs are broader, more efficient, and generally more progressive. This polling shows, however, that Democrats need to make the case that universal programs are more progressive than means-testing.

From The Blog
Candidates and Medicare for All Messaging
Voters Oppose Automatically Enrolling The Uninsured In A Government Option
Iowa Voters Support the Progressive Agenda
The Public Doesn’t Want to Means-Test Public Education
South Carolina Democrats Support The Progressive Agenda
Here’s Where Congressional Candidates Stand On The Progressive Labor Agenda


Media Hits
Bernie Sanders can unify Democrats and beat Trump in 2020 @Vox
New poll finds majority of New Yorkers back wealth tax @New York Daily News
The Latest Green New Deal for Farmers Would Restructure Everything About How They Make Money @Mother Jones
Support growing in state legislature for “good cause” eviction @The Real Deal
Julian Brave NoiseCat on Democracy Now @Democracy Now


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