SALT LAKE CITY – Proud?  Angry?  Disappointed?  How do Utahns feel about being represented by Senator Mitt Romney after he voted to convict President Trump on abuse of power and remove him from office?  A new poll gauging Mitt Romney’s approval rating shows people are very divided, but more people feel positive about him than negative.

Not your typical poll

This poll was not typical in the kind of questions it asked.  Instead of asking of whether or not someone supports or opposes Romney, it provided respondents with a list of emotions they could choose from.  The Deseret News-Hinckley poll with KSL, conducted by Scott Rasmussen, shows 21% claimed they feel “proud” to have Romney represent them while 14% say they’re “encouraged,” 13% were “pleased” and 11% were “embarrassed.”  Rasmussen tells KSL he wanted to determine how angry Republicans were at Romney’s decision.

“Eight percent of all voters, 12% of Republicans were ‘angry,’ but a much larger segment were saying, ‘No, we’re just mildly disappointed,’” Rasmussen says.

Overall, 49% of people said their reactions were on the positive side, while 40% said they were negative and another 11% didn’t know.  Rasmussen calls this reaction relatively mild.

He says, “Some of the events that the political world thinks are ‘momentous’ and are going to change everybody’s mind just don’t have that much of an impact on outside political circles.”

Naturally, the numbers for Mitt Romney’s approval rating are very different when you break them down along party lines. Two out of every three Republicans polled reacted negatively, while 83% of Democrats were positive.

 

No clear answer yet

“Republicans are not quite as negative as Democrats are positive,” according to Hinckley Institute of Politics Director Jason Perry.  “It’s just not a clear, easy answer.  Did he make the right choice or the wrong choice, as far as Utahns are concerned?  Both sides of the aisle is the reality.”

The new poll also shows Romney’s overall approval rating has taken a hit, with 49% of Republicans disapproving his performance.  It also shows more than half of Republicans polled said they were less likely to vote for him.

 

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