Democrats Drop and Republicans Rise, but the Real Juice Is With the Independents

Democrats lost support during 2021. Throughout each year, Gallup looks at political party preferences in America. For decades, identification with the Democratic Party has outperformed identification with Republicans and last year was no different on average, with 46 percent of those surveyed saying they were or leaned Democrat and just 43 percent saying they were or leaned Republican. But drilling down on the data tells a different story.

At the start of 2021, 49 percent aligned more with Democrats and 40 percent with Republicans. By the second quarter of 2021, this...