The debate about closing Guantanamo, and especially this piece, entitled “Guantánamo Closing Hands Republicans a Wedge Issue,” got me interested in public opinion about the subject. What I found is sort of a mess. Recent polls don’t tell a clear story about even simple questions like whether to close Guantanamo. And there seems to be no polling that speaks to the nuances of the political debate.
The authors of the NY Times piece, David Kirkpatrick and David Herszenhorn, write:
bq. Armed with polling data that show a narrow majority of support for keeping the prison open and deep fear about the detainees, Republicans in Congress started laying plans even before the inauguration to make the debate over Guantánamo Bay a question of local community safety instead of one about national character and principles.
The most recent poll on closing Guantanamo that I could find is an April 22-26 CBS/NYT poll (pdf). It asked:
bq. As you may know, for the past seven years the United States has been holding a number of suspected terrorists at a U.S. military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Based on what you have heard or read, do you think the U.S. should continue to operate the prison, or do you think the U.S. should close the prison and transfer the prisoners somewhere else?
In this poll, 47% supported keeping it open and 44% supported closing it. That’s technically plurality support for keeping it open, not a “narrow majority.” But close enough. However, an April 20-22 Fox News poll finds actual majority support (pdf). It asks this question:
bq. Do you think the military prison at Guantanamo Bay should be closed, or not?
53% of respondents said it should not be closed, 33% said that it should, and 14% did not know. A 20-point difference is much larger than a 3-point difference, obviously. Part of the discrepancy could be due to different question wordings. Part could be due to sampling: Fox News sampled registered voters and CBS/NYT sampled adults. But neither seems entirely sufficient to explain the discrepancy. Ultimately, I would be comfortable characterizing saying that more people favor ongoing imprisonment at Guantanamo than favor closing the prison. But whether those people constitute a “majority” or whether that “majority” is “narrow” depends on which poll you’re looking at.
In any case, I am not sure about H&H’s claim about “deep fear.” I couldn’t find a recent poll that directly spoke to this (at least here). Later on, H&H cite an internal GOP poll, although I don’t think it’s meant to buttress the claim above:
bq. And to help sharpen the Republican attacks, Ed Gillespie, who was an adviser to President George W. Bush, and Whit Ayers, a Republican pollster, distributed a survey in April indicating strong support for the idea of keeping “people who would kill Americans” at Guantánamo.
I can’t find detailed information about the poll on-line. The question seems loaded, in any case. I would like to see a poll asking whether people think that Guantanamo inmates who are held in Supermax facilities (like some other convicted terrorists) are a serious threat, or whether people think that such facilities are sufficiently secure. That would speak more directly to the issue of “deep fear.” If lots of people think our best prisons aren’t secure enough, then I’d call that “deep fear.”
Second, the argument that Gitmo is a “wedge issue” implies that Republicans can maintain consensus while earning the support of some Democrats. In that same CBS/NYT poll, 62% of Democrats wanted to close Guantanamo, and 30% wanted to keep it open. Interestingly, the Republicans were almost as divided: 70% wanted to keep it open, and 24% wanted to close it. (H&H note that some prominent Republicans, like McCain, support closing it.)
The Fox News data are less ambiguous. In their April poll, only 11% of Republicans wanted to close Guantanamo, and 32% of Democrats wanted to keep it open. That larger asymmetry more clearly favors Republicans.
Finally, H&H argue that public opinion is trending: “With public opinion moving against them and still no detailed plan from the president, House Democrats were the first to block the $80 million the White House had requested to close the prison.”
The Fox News data support H&H’s claim: In January 2009, 47% wanted to close Guantanamo and 45% wanted to keep it open. That’s since shifted to the 33-53, as noted above.
However, the CBS/NYT data show the opposite. In July 2006, 34% wanted to close Guantanamo. That increased to 40% in January 2009 and to 44% in February 2009. It’s still at 44% in that April poll.
The two sets of polling data do not tell a clear story about trends.
So what are we to make of this? I don’t think this issue is a slam-dunk for either party. First of all, simple questions about whether to close Guantanamo don’t probe the possible alternatives.[1] Here is ABC pollster Gary Langer:
bq. Our own polling has shown the divisions in some more detail. When we asked in January, 53 percent wanted to find some other way to deal with these detainees, a majority but not an overpowering one. Most looking for an alternative favored U.S. trials, but a third wanted the detainees sent to face trial in their home countries. Break it up this way and you actually get a plurality for keeping Gitmo open: Continue to keep terrorism suspects there, 42 percent; try them in U.S. courts, 33 percent; try them in their home countries, 17 percent.
Obama’s challenge is convincing those who are willing to close Guantanamo that his alternative is preferable. This will take some doing. I think that ultimately there will be majority support for a plan that deals with detainees on a case-by-case basis: the worst are simply detained; others are tried in military tribunals; others are tried in federal courts; and others are returned to their home countries or some other country. Presumably this would need to be accompanied by further arguments that we can detain KSM and others on US soil without any real danger. I haven’t seen anyone poll Obama’s plan directly. I am curious how the public would respond.
The challenge for the GOP is that news-cycle momentum — which it arguably developed last week — is often fleeting. If Obama can come up with a plan that earns the support of McCain and some other prominent and well-regarded Republicans (e.g., Colin Powell, Lugar, etc.), then he will probably peel off Republicans who are concerned that Guantanamo hurts other strategic interests. And, if some Republican moderates support Obama, then this may hurt the GOP because it would play into the whole media narrative about the “shrinking Republican tent.”
Ultimately, any political analysis of this debate — mine included — will be largely speculative in the absence of better public opinion data. I hope that some pollsters will put some more detailed questions into the field.
fn1. The April Fox News poll asked about one alternative: moving detainees to the United States. The poll asks:
bq. In talking about what might happen to detainees when the Guantanamo Bay prison is closed, recently National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair said some of the prisoners may be released in the United States and suggested it may be necessary to give them assistance for them to start a new life. Do you favor or oppose using taxpayer dollars to help prisoners released from Guantanamo Bay?
72% opposed this plan and 19% supported it. But this poll is not about what to do with KSM et al., but, in essence, whether people support Blair’s comments about helping the Uighur detainees. I think the more pertinent question is whether the U.S. should try and/or imprison detainees in U.S. courts and prisons.