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


Memo: Sanders Has Strong Lead in Nevada
We just broke the dearth of Nevada polling with a groundbreaking finding: Sanders has a 19 point lead in the Silver State.

Our poll found Sanders with 35 percent of the Nevada vote, followed by Elizabeth Warren (16 percent), Pete Buttigieg (15 percent), and Joe Biden (14 percent). 



Sanders’ lead is largely attributable to Hispanic voters, two-thirds of which — 66 percent — support the Vermont senator. No other candidate even reached double digits. Sanders is also leading among voters aged 45+ and “somewhat liberal” voters, attesting to his broad appeal.

Sanders’ strong results are largely because his agenda is popular — 69 percent of Nevada Democrats support Medicare for All and 93 percent support the Green New Deal.




Memo: Policy Platform and Polling on the Decriminalization of Sex Work
We recently released a huge report on the decriminalization of sex work in partnership with 28 organizations, including the ACLU, the Center for Constitutional Rights, BYP100, National Center for Transgender Equality, and Mijente. It’s our most extensive partner work yet, and it includes polling showing for the first time ever that a majority of Americans support decriminalizing sex work.

Most sex workers trade sex out of circumstance to meet economic needs. The memo includes interviews conducted in which sex workers share their personal experiences and the circumstances that led them to pursue sex work.



Since sex work disproportionately targets communities of color, immigrants, LGBTQ+ youth, and women, decriminalizing sex work would advance racial, LGBTQ+, and gender justice. It could also prevent trafficking in the sex trades, allow for safer working conditions, and significantly reduce HIV/AIDS infections by reducing criminalization of safer sex practices. 

Our memo outlines specific ways that states, counties, and cities can decriminalize sex work, including:

• Repealing statutes that penalize sex trade between consenting adults

• Defunding and dismantling vice policing units and investigating misconduct by law enforcement officers against sex workers

• Prohibiting employment discrimination based on criminal records

• Amending labor protections to include people in the sex trades

• Expanding affordable housing and funding shelters that specifically house and affirm LGBTQ+ youth experiencing homelessness

Are the American people on board with these changes? Our polling finds that they are. 52 percent of Americans — including 64 percent of Democrats and 55 percent of independents — support decriminalizing sex work as New Zealand did in 2003. Only 35 percent of Americans oppose.



We also found that a strong plurality of Americans — 49 percent — support ending vice policing, which targets sex workers with strategies like undercover stings and raids in which plainclothes officers solicit sex workers and then arrest them. Again, only 35 percent opposed.

Please read our full memo, and check out these New Republic and Intercept pieces covering our research.


Sanders is Leading the Grassroots Endorsement Race
Bernie Sanders has been in the news recently because Nevada’s powerful Culinary Union is distributing flyers alleging that his health plan would “end Culinary Healthcare.” But although this particular union is criticizing Sanders, our new analysis finds that overall, Bernie is killing it with grassroots endorsements.

Although Biden has picked up some big union endorsements, including the IBEW and IAFF, Sanders leads the pack with the most individual union endorsements. He’s dominating the field with 29, followed by Biden (10) and Warren (4).



He’s also performing extremely well with advocacy and coalition groups like the Sunrise Movement. Sanders is sweeping the field with 21 endorsements, followed by Warren (3), Biden (1), and Buttigieg (1).




Our Iowa and New Hampshire Polling Was Pretty Damn Good
Iowa was an absolute shitshow, but our polling on the state was accurate. They were the most accurate of any Iowa polls, according to an analysis by G. Elliott Morris.



Our poll had the lowest mean error of vote shares for Biden, Sanders, Warren, Buttigieg, Klobuchar & Yang, at just 2.3%. That’s better than Siena/NYT (2.8%) and Selzer & Co. (3.1%).

Our New Hampshire polling was also accurate. Our pre-primary poll showed Sanders beating Buttigieg by a 28 percent to 26 percent margin, very close to the actual 26-to-24 result. Our poll also had Biden in fifth with 9 percent, right in line with the 8.4 percent he actually got.

Thanks to FiveThirtyEight’s Harry Enten for the shoutout.


Educators Are Fed Up and Voters are on Their Side
From Chicago to West Virginia, teachers unions have been striking — and winning. But does the general public support the movement for progressive education reform?

Our recent polling suggests that they do. We found that 69 percent of respondents support raising federal funds to eliminate student lunch debt, while just 21 percent opposed. We also found that a majority of voters — 51 percent to 31 percent — believe that we should stop using standardized tests to fire teachers, close schools, or change funding.



One more finding: a majority or plurality of Americans support capping student-to-staff ratios, increasing funding to hire more diverse teachers, and increasing Title I funding for low-income schools from $15.9 to $44.9 billion.


Standing in Solidarity for Our Future
In a recent blog post, Jason Walsh, Executive Director of the Blue Green Alliance, made the case for the Solidarity for Climate Action platform to create good-paying, union jobs while tackling the climate crisis.

“From clean cars standards that support hundreds of thousands of jobs across the country to the jobs potential of capturing wasteful and preventable methane emissions in the oil and gas industry, actions that reduce climate emissions have been shown again and again to create and sustain good jobs,” Walsh argues.


Data Bytes

• Memo: Progressives Control the Future of the Democratic Party: We released a new memo showing that a plurality of registered voters support four ambitious policies on the progressive agenda: a deportation moratorium, Medicare for All, a $2.5 trillion investment in public housing, and a 70 percent marginal tax rate.
  
  
  
  These findings show that even the bolder items on the progressive agenda have positive net support nationwide. Another finding from the memo: a plurality of Democrats prefer socialism to capitalism.
  
  
   

• Medicare for All Polls Really Well in South Carolina: The South Carolina primaries are approaching, and Democratic voters across the state support Medicare for All. When respondents were told that Medicare for All would place all Americans on a single, government-run plan that would eliminate premiums, deductibles, and co-pays, 77 percent said they’d support the policy. Just 16 percent opposed.
  
  We also released polling data on Friday showing that nationwide, Democrats support Medicare for All. Democrats have 42 percent net support for Medicare for All that abolishes private insurance (66 percent support, 23 percent oppose), 80 percent net support for Medicare for All that doesn’t abolish private insurance, and 75 percent net support for a public option.
  
  
   

• Bernie Sanders leads Donald Trump in polls, even when you remind people he’s a socialist: Our polling was covered in a recent Vox piece, and it showed that even after we told respondents that Trump called Sanders “a socialist who supports a government takeover of healthcare and open borders,” they still preferred Bernie over Trump by a 47-42 margin.
   

• Stop Tweeting, Start Building Organizations and Talk to Your Friends: Twitter is fun, but it often does little in terms of grassroots activism. Our new analysis shows that being asked to go to an impeachment protest by a friend, family member, or organization is a significant predictor of attendance, but social media invites are not strong predictors. Less tweeting, more organizing!
  
  
  
   

• The Day One Agenda Polls Pretty Well: A recent piece from The American Prospect compiled our polling data to show that executive orders that progressives like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren could implement on Day One are overwhelmingly popular.
  
  These include legalizing marijuana (58 percent support, 33 percent oppose), regulating pollutants like mercury, coal ash, and methane (59-33), “red flag” laws (54-38), closing the carried interest loophole that allows hedge fund managers to pay a lower tax rate (50-33), and preventing defense contractor executives and lobbyists from administration positions (45-38).
   

• Whiteness as the Defining Predictor in American Politics: We showed in a recent blog post that whiteness is a powerful predictor of how Americans vote in presidential elections. Our model found that after accounting for 2012 vote share, the top predictor of how a county voted in 2016 vote is how white it is.
  
  
  
   

From The Blog
Why AOC Was Right About HQ2
Educators Are Fed Up And Voters Are On Their Side
Stop Tweeting, Start Building Organizations and Talk to Your Friends
Ambivalent Support, Part 2: Supporting A Non-Preferred Candidate
What Can We Learn From Asking People to Talk About Candidates?
Voters Support Underground Wires To Reduce Wildfires
Whiteness as the Defining Predictor in American Politics
Standing in Solidarity for Our Future
Sanders Leading The Grassroots Endorsement Race
Democrats Support Medicare for All
Attitudes About Norms Among Democratic Primary Voters


Media Hits
The Day One Agenda Polls Pretty Well @The American Prospect
Bernie Sanders leads Donald Trump in polls, even when you remind people he’s a socialist @Vox
South Carolina Democrats Sure Sound Open to Medicare for All @New York Magazine
The Majority of Voters Now Support Decriminalizing Sex Work. It’s About Time. @The Intercept
The New Majority Behind Sex Work Decriminalization @The New Republic
Poll: Majority supports decriminalizing sex work @The Hill
New Polling Shows That for the First Time Ever, a Majority of Americans Support Decriminalizing Sex Work @Common Dreams
Poll: Sanders holds 19-point lead in Nevada @The Hill


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