A new YouGov survey asked Americans whether they think the Democratic Party or the Republican Party does a better job handling each of 20 issues. Both Democrats and Republicans have changed their views since last year on several key issues. For example, Democrats are less likely now than they were in August 2024 to say the Democratic Party does a better job at handling guns (69%, down from 80%). Meanwhile, Republicans are less likely now than they were last summer to say the Republican Party does a better job handling inflation (80%, down from 87%).
Issues that Americans are more likely to think the Democratic Party does a better job handling than to think the Republican Party does include LGBTQ issues (49% say the Democratic Party handles this better vs. 24% who say the Republican Party), the environment (44% vs. 25%), health care (43% vs. 26%), and abortion (43% vs. 32%).
The issues Americans are more likely to think the Republican Party does a better job handling than to think the Democratic Party does include immigration (41% vs. 34%), crime (39% vs. 28%), and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (32% vs. 23%).
Opinions among Americans overall have changed little on most issues since this question was asked about 14 of the same issues on a YouGov survey in August 2024. The one notable change is in the shares of Americans who say the Democratic Party does a better job handling guns: 31%, down from 36% in August 2024.
More Americans approve of President Donald Trump's handling of several of these issues than say they think the Republican Party handles them better, according to the latest Economist/YouGov poll.
Majorities of Democrats think the Democratic Party does a better job handling 19 of the 20 issues asked about. The exception is artificial intelligence: 44% of Democrats think the Democratic Party does a better job handling AI, 3% think the Republican Party does a better job, 24% say both are about the same, and 29% are not sure.
Majorities of Republicans think the Republican Party does a better job handling all 20 of the issues asked about.
Democrats are less likely than they were last summer to say the Democratic Party does a better job than the Republican Party of handling guns (69%, down from 80% in August 2024), the Ukraine-Russia conflict (66%, down from 71%), and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (51%, down from 57%).
Since August 2024, greater shares of Democrats say the Democratic Party does a better job than the Republican Party of handling the economy (82%, up from 72% in August 2024), inflation (76%, up from 67%), and crime (67%, up from 61%).
Among Republicans, the biggest increases in confidence in their party are on the issues of LGBTQ issues (56% think the Republican Party does a better job than the Democratic Party of handling this, up from 46% who said this last August), the Ukraine-Russia conflict (76%, up from 68%), and abortion (72%, up from 65%).
Republicans are less likely now than they were in August 2024 to say the Republican Party does a better job handling inflation (80%, down from 87%).
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- Tracking opinion on Donald Trump's second-term policy agenda
- How many Americans are MAGA?
See the results for this YouGov survey
— Carl Bialik and Taylor Orth contributed to this article
Methodology: This article includes results from an online survey conducted May 16 - 19, 2025 among 1,148 U.S. adult citizens. Respondents were selected from YouGov’s opt-in panel to be representative of adult U.S. citizens. The sample was weighted according to gender, age, race, education, 2024 presidential vote, 2020 election turnout and presidential vote, baseline party identification, and current voter registration status. 2024 presidential vote, at time of weighting, was estimated to be 48% Harris and 50% Trump. Demographic weighting targets come from the 2019 American Community Survey. Baseline party identification is the respondent’s most recent answer given around November 8, 2024, and is weighted to the estimated distribution at that time (31% Democratic, 32% Republican). The margin of error for the overall sample is approximately 4%.
Image: Getty
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