In this week's podcast, Jim Henson and Joshua Blank look at public trust in Texas toward the U.S. Supreme Court and the other branches of government as a backdrop for Republican efforts to nominate and confirm a replacement for the late Ruth Bader Ginsberg. Below the podcast link, find graphics of data and links that are discussed in their conversation.
Snapshots of trust in the branches of the U.S. government from the University of Texas/Texas Tribune Poll during both the Obama and Trump presidencies.
| Category | Democrat | Independent | Republican |
|---|---|---|---|
| The U.S. Congress, the legislative branch | 24% | 6% | 2% |
| The President, the executive branch | 3% | 17% | 54% |
| The U.S. Supreme Court, the judicial branch | 36% | 40% | 24% |
| Don't know | 38% | 38% | 20% |
| category | Democrat | Independent | Republican |
|---|---|---|---|
| The U.S. Congress, the legislative branch | 6% | 9% | 30% |
| The President, the executive branch | 41% | 8% | 1% |
| The U.S. Supreme Court, the judicial branch | 23% | 34% | 23% |
| Don't know | 30% | 49% | 45% |
| category | Democrat | Independent | Republican |
|---|---|---|---|
| The U.S. Congress, the legislative branch | 1% | 11% | 19% |
| The President, the executive branch | 61% | 18% | 2% |
| The U.S. Supreme Court, the judicial branch | 22% | 38% | 45% |
| Don't know | 16% | 33% | 34% |
The Texas Politics Project poll data archive contains seven results on the item beween 2012 and 2020 for viewing and downloading, with overall results and multiple cross tabs.
About the Second Reading podcast. The podcast has been produced intermittently by the Texas Politics Project, with production support from UT's Liberal Arts Development Studio, since 2016, primarily as an instructional component for a course in Texas government and politics offered by the government department at UT Austin during summer semesters. These shows were generally hosted by Jim Henson, who designed the UT course, and usually featured Josh Blank, with intermittent in-studio guests. The podcasts have been publicly available via major podcast channels, but haven't been marketed to the public. The podcast is again part of the instructional design of GOV 312L: Politics and Government in Contemporary Texas during the Summer 2020 semester. The plan is to transistion from probably the longest soft-launch in the short but rich history of podcasting to a weekly public podcast in late summer/early fall of 2020. You can find past episodes and subscribe to the Second Reading podcast in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Stitcher.