Gallup: TEA Party demographics represent mainstream America

Of course, many of the mainstream TEA Party members are more conservative than liberal, but we’ve been told by the media there are few “other than white” faces at TEA Party events. Will Gallup’s recent poll put an end to the TEA Party race component question?

USA Today and Gallup got together to conduct telephone interviews with about 1,000 adults at the end of March. About three in 10 proclaimed they were supporters of the TEA Party movement. From the Gallup site

Tea Party supporters are decidedly Republican and conservative in their leanings. Also, compared with average Americans, supporters are slightly more likely to be male and less likely to be lower-income.

In several other respects, however — their age, educational background, employment status, and race — Tea Partiers are quite representative of the public at large.

No kiddin’?

Sister Toldja has more about the TEA Party myths that seem to be busted by reality. Also, Gateway Pundit notes four in 10 TEA Party members are independents or Democrats, from The Hill

The national breakdown of the Tea Party composition is 57 percent Republican, 28 percent Independent and 13 percent Democratic, according to three national polls by the Winston Group, a Republican-leaning firm that conducted the surveys on behalf of an education advocacy group. Two-thirds of the group call themselves conservative, 26 are moderate and 8 percent say they are liberal.

Add this all up – from a variety of sources – and you’ll get the impression Democrats are in big trouble come November. I hate to ask such a stupid question since it points out we Americans have very short memories, but has conservatism “peaked” too soon?

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Steve McGough

Steve's a part-time conservative blogger. Steve grew up in Connecticut and has lived in Washington, D.C. and the Bahamas. He resides in Connecticut, where he’s comfortable six months of the year.

7 Comments

  1. PatRiot on April 5, 2010 at 4:29 pm

    The poll is VERY telling.  Average huh!  That means if you look at the bell curve of pollitics, most Americans hover in the middle, the highest point, with the extreme folks in less numbers at each end.  Why the middle?  Because that is where common sense is.  That is the real power:  Numbers and common sense.  We just have to put them to use.  Nothing average about this – it is empowering.



  2. dom on April 5, 2010 at 5:34 pm

    Are you assuming tea party "members"and tea party "supporters" are one in the same? If not, then the poll has no validity, since it profiles tea party "supporters."



  3. mrplumpo on April 18, 2010 at 8:07 am

    Uhhhh…. hey guys, let's not over-misinterpret the poll. Read the numbers: 79% of the Tea Party members are non-hispanic white. That means 8 out of 10 members are White. 68% also lack a college degree, more than 55% earn over $50,000 a year, 55% are men, and over half of the members are 50 years old or above.

    This is EXACTLY what the popular perception of a Tea Partier is ~ a White, uneducated, middle-aged affluent man. Look at the poll numbers and tell me that's not what it says.

    What this poll inherently reveals is that these numbers reflect and are in line with national statistics on demographic makeup ~ NOT that the Tea Party is some sort of melting pot of culture and social strata.



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