Poll: ‘Kavanaugh effect’ spurs more to vote Democrat than Republican

The brutal battle over Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation has spurred more people to vote Democrat than Republican, according to a new poll.

Of those surveyed, 35 percent said Kavanaugh’s confirmation made them more inclined to vote for a Democrat in the 2018 congressional races, according to a USA Today–Suffolk University poll released in part Tuesday. Twenty-seven percent of respondents said Kavanaugh’s confirmation would push them to vote for a Republican congressional candidate.

Thirty-seven percent of respondents said the confirmation would not affect their vote.

{mosads}Kavanaugh’s confirmation became a fierce battle after three separate women accused him of varying degrees of sexual misconduct.

Kavanaugh has vehemently denied all the allegations.

One week before his originally scheduled confirmation vote, it emerged that Christine Blasey Ford alleged Kavanaugh had sexually assaulted her at a party in the 1980s, when the two were in high school.

An FBI investigation into that matter found no corroborating evidence, and the Senate voted to confirm Kavanaugh 50-48, largely along party lines. 

Democrats argued the agency’s probe was not adequately thorough.

After the Kavanaugh confirmation, Democrats lost ground in polling in a number of Senate races.

USA Today reported Wednesday that 33 percent of its respondents said Kavanaugh’s confirmation made them “angry” and 26 percent said they were “delighted” by it.

Only 6 percent said his confirmation “doesn’t matter one way or the other.”

Forty-five percent of respondents said that Kavanaugh’s confirmation was a “bad thing,” while 35 percent said it was a “good thing.”

However, a strong majority of respondents said they had a favorable impression of the Supreme Court, by 55 to 25 percent.

The USA Today–Suffolk University pollsters surveyed 1,000 likely voters from Oct. 18 to 22, and the poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.