Americans overwhelmingly want Congress to defy Trump and override his veto of the bor

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Americans overwhelmingly want Congress to defy Trump and override his veto of the border wall emergency declaration
By: Joe Perticone / Business Insider - 4-18-19
RE: https://www.businessinsider.com/amer...de-poll-2019-3

- Americans support an override of President Trump's veto of the resolution that aimed to terminate his national emergency declaration to build a wall on the US-Mexico border by a two to one margin, according to a new poll.

- Opposition and support for a veto override are starkly divided along political affiliations.

- As it stands, Congress is unlikely to have enough votes in either chamber to override the veto.

- The House is scheduled to vote on the veto override on March 26.

Americans support an override of President Donald Trump's veto of the resolution to terminate the national emergency declaration allowing the White House to divert funds from military projects to build walls and physical barriers along the United States-Mexico border by two to one.

According to a new poll conducted by INSIDER, nearly twice as many Americans favor a congressional override or Trump's veto than oppose such a move.

A total of 46% of respondents support Congress overriding the veto. 39% of those surveyed strongly supported the move and 7% somewhat supported such action.

In contrast, a total of 27% of people oppose a veto override. 19% strongly oppose an override and 8% somewhat oppose it.

In addition, 17% said they neither support or oppose a veto override and 10% do not know.

Read more: The lawsuits challenging Trump's national emergency declaration to build the border wall keep piling up

The differences in opinion are much more drastic when accounting for political affiliation. For respondents who identify as "very conservative," 65% opposed a veto override, while 71% of "very liberal" respondents said they support it.

A congressional override of a presidential veto is a heavy lift and very rare, as it requires two-thirds support in both chambers. For context, former President Barack Obama did not receive a veto override until his final year in office.

The House is slated to vote on the veto override on March 26, though proponents of the resolution to terminate Trump's emergency declaration are a far cry from reaching the two-thirds threshold. In the Senate, where 12 Republicans joined all 47 Democrats to reject the emergency declaration, they are still eight votes short of an override.

Republicans who joined Democrats in pushing back on Trump's use of emergency powers to get around Congress cited the president's action as inconsistent with their constitutional duties, comparing it to their opposition to Obama's past executive actions.

"We experienced a similar erosion of congressional authority with President Obama's unilateral immigration orders — which I strenuously opposed," Republican Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah said in a statement before the vote on Thursday. "In the case before us now, where Congress has enacted specific policy, to consent to an emergency declaration would be both inconsistent with my beliefs and contrary to my oath to defend the constitution."

Still, the emergency declaration also faces a handful of lawsuits, including from a coalition of almost two dozen states led by California.

And even Republicans who supported the emergency declaration, like Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, have acknowledged that it is likely to be resolved in the courts.

"It's not a constitutional question," Cornyn said. "It is really going to be a question for the courts, of statutory interpretation and what Congress's intent was."

SurveyMonkey Audience polls from a national sample balanced by census data of age and gender. Respondents are incentivized to complete surveys through charitable contributions. Generally speaking, digital polling tends to skew toward people with access to the internet. SurveyMonkey Audience doesn't try to weight its sample based on race or income. Total 1,178 respondents collected March 16-17, 2019, a margin of error plus or minus 3.07 percentage points with a 95% confidence level.