Et Tu Minnesota? Klobuchar Disapproval Rating Soars to Record High After Franken Is Seated

As unemployment continued to rise and economic and budget concerns reached near crisis levels across most states, several U.S. Senators, both Democrats and Republicans, saw their approval ratings slip noticeably during the first several months of 2009.

One of the few Senators left seemingly unscathed by this backlash of public opinion against its leaders in Washington, D.C. was Minnesota senior Senator, DFLer Amy Klobuchar.

Minnesotans showed particular good will towards Klobuchar during these trying times while other Senators were enduring low public approval ratings across the country. This good will may have been due, in part, to Senator Klobuchar’s toiling, without much complaint, under a double-duty constituency caseload as the Gopher State slogged through the legal proceedings in the 2008 U.S. Senate contest between Norm Coleman and Al Franken.

However, just a few weeks after Franken was seated as Minnesota’s junior Senator in early July, Klobuchar’s approval rating dropped by a significant amount, and her disapproval rating increased by double digits in one month. (As had happened to many of her colleagues earlier in the year).

In short, with the Gopher State now at full representation in D.C., Senator Klobuchar seemed to no longer be insulated from the public discontent with the problems facing Minnesota and the country.

According to SurveyUSA’s latest round of monthly polling, Klobuchar’s approval rating fell from 62 percent in June to 54 percent in mid-July – her second lowest mark of her D.C. career, behind only the 52 percent she notched in a May 2007 SurveyUSA Poll.

Even more striking, 42 percent of Gopher State residents disapproved of the job Klobuchar is doing as Senator – her highest red mark ever and the first time that number has reached the 40 percent mark in her 2.5 years on the Hill. Klobuchar’s disapproval rating increased 35.5 percent in just one month: from 31 to 42 percent.

While it is dangerous to read too much into one poll, it is important to note, as Smart Politics reported earlier this year, Klobuchar’s numbers had previously remained remarkably flat over the course of her tenure in Washington in poll after poll.

In 22 consecutive polls conducted by SurveyUSA between July 2007 and June 2009, Klobuchar’s approval rating had a variance of just 5 points – falling between 58 and 63 percent in every survey. Similarly, her disapproval rating had been measured between 30 and 36 percent in every SurveyUSA poll during this two-year stretch.

The fact that Klobuchar’s approval rating should dip to its second lowest level, and her disapproval rating reach an all-time high, in the very first month in which Al Franken officially became her colleague in D.C. is ‘curious’ at the very least.

As a result of this apparent shift in public sentiment, Klobuchar has now endured the 4th largest drop in net approval rating since Barack Obama took office in January of this year among the 25 Senators tracked by SurveyUSA.

Fellow Upper Midwesterner Herb Kohl (D-WI) has seen the biggest net drop, at minus 23 points during this span.

Overall, these 25 Senators have seen their collective +24.8-point net approval rating in January fall to +14.2 points in July.

But this growing disapproval by the public toward the job its Senators are doing in Washington has not been evenly distributed between Democrats and Republicans. The Republicans have seen their net approval rating drop an average of 6.6 points from January to July, while the Democrats have seen their net approval rating drop nearly twice that amount at 12.5 points. (SurveyUSA tracks the approval rating of 8 GOP Senators and 17 Democrats).

Decline in Net Approval Rating Among U.S. Senators, January – July 2009

State	Senator	Party	Jan-09	Jul-09	Change
WI	Herb Kohl	Dem	+37	+14	-23
NM	Tom Udall	Dem	+39	+19	-20
OR	Ron Wyden	Dem	+37	+19	-18
MN	Amy Klobuchar	Dem	+29	+12	-17
IA	Charles Grassley	GOP	+49	+32	-17
KS	Pat Roberts	GOP	+31	+16	-15
WA	Maria Cantwell	Dem	+23	+8	-15
VA	Mark Warner	Dem	+47	+32	-15
NY	Chuck Schumer	Dem	+36	+22	-14
WA	Patty Murray	Dem	+19	+5	-14
WI	Russ Feingold	Dem	+30	+17	-13
MO	Claire McCaskill	Dem	+13	0	-13
NM	Jeff Bingaman	Dem	+37	+24	-13
KY	Jim Bunning	GOP	-1	-12	-11
VA	Jim Webb	Dem	+19	+11	-8
CA	Diane Feinstein	Dem	+20	+12	-8
MO	Kit Bond	GOP	+24	+16	-8
NY	Kirsten Gillibrand*	Dem	+8	+1	-7
CA	Barbara Boxer	Dem	+14	+8	-6
OR	Jeff Merkley	Dem	+8	+3	-5
IA	Tom Harkin	Dem	+25	+21	-4
AL	Jeff Sessions	GOP	+31	+29	-2
KS	Sam Brownback	GOP	+18	+16	-2
AL	Richard Shelby	GOP	+31	+31	0
KY	Mitch McConnell	GOP	-4	-2	+2
	Average		+24.8	+14.2	-10.6

* Approval rating begins in February 2009 when Gillibrand took office. SurveyUSA data compiled by Smart Politics.

The same SurveyUSA poll also measured an all-time low in approval rating statewide for Barack Obama, and, more importantly, a four-year high in Republican Party ID.

As such, the big question is whether there is real movement towards the GOP in the Gopher State or whether a higher than normal sampling of Republicans in the poll’s respondents (though within the margin of error) is driving these numbers.

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