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Environmental Polling Roundup – June 27, 2025

David Gold David Gold

Headlines

Environmental Polling Consortium – Clean energy cuts in the reconciliation bill are consistently unpopular, including in polls from non-partisan and right-of-center sources, as no segment of the population wants to roll back clean energy and there are clear concerns about the impacts of energy cuts on costs and jobs [Memo]

AP-NORC – Americans overwhelmingly agree that the federal government should have a role in combatting climate change and handling weather disasters; support for solar and wind energy has slipped in recent years [Website, Topline]

Data for Progress – Voters are troubled to hear that the EPA is ending regulations on carbon dioxide and mercury pollution from power plants, as bipartisan majorities say that these rules should be kept in place [Article, Crosstabs]

The Economist + YouGov – Many major provisions of Republicans’ budget plans are unpopular, including ending tax credits for clean energy [Topline, Crosstabs]

American Energy American Jobs (AEAJ) – Voters in Republican-held states and districts say that they would be less likely to vote to re-elect members of the U.S. House and Senate who vote to end federal energy investments, as voters are concerned that eliminating these investments would cost jobs and raise energy bills [Summary Memo, Links to state- and district-specific memos]

Key Takeaways

Messages against clean energy rollbacks that focus on costs and energy independence continue to resonate. Polls in red-leaning states and Republican-held districts conducted by Republican polling firm Meeting Street Insights for American Energy American Jobs find that majorities in these conservative-leaning geographies agree with the following arguments against clean energy rollbacks:

“Industry and local business leaders believe [cuts to energy investments] will slow down manufacturing in this country, threaten hundreds of thousands of American jobs, and raise electricity costs for all Americans.”

“The U.S. is falling behind China in the energy race, and these investments are vital to creating American jobs, lowering energy costs, and ensuring the U.S.—not China—leads the world in the technologies of the future.”

The persuasiveness of these arguments is consistent with recent polling commissioned by Climate Power. Their polling found that the most effective frames for defending federal clean energy investments focused on costs and national security / energy independence, as well as grid reliability.

These and other findings from polling about clean energy in the reconciliation bill are included in the EPC’s new summary memo on the topic.

Voters widely agree on rules to limit pollution from dirty energy sources, with far less polarization than we see on other environmental topics. Data for Progress finds that bipartisan majorities of voters want the EPA to maintain its current rules on mercury and carbon dioxide pollution from power plants, which Trump’s EPA recently announced plans to repeal.

This bipartisan agreement about the need for adequate power plant pollution limits echoes what we’ve seen in polling about vehicle emissions. While Democrats and Republicans tend to disagree about policies to phase out fossil fuels in favor of clean energy, no constituency wants pollution from our existing fossil fuel-powered technologies to go unchecked.

Good Data Points to Highlight

Full Roundup

Environmental Polling Consortium – Clean energy cuts in the reconciliation bill are consistently unpopular, including in polls from non-partisan and right-of-center sources, as no segment of the population wants to roll back clean energy and there are clear concerns about the impacts of energy cuts on costs and jobs [Memo]

Compiling recent polling data from left-of-center, non-partisan, and right-of-center sources, we find several consistent findings in polling about the reconciliation bill’s proposed cuts to clean energy:

AP-NORC – Americans overwhelmingly agree that the federal government should have a role in combatting climate change and handling weather disasters; support for solar and wind energy has slipped in recent years [Website, Topline]

Americans widely agree that the federal government should have a role in combatting climate change. A majority (56%) say that the federal government should have a “major” role in combatting climate change to try to keep extreme weather from getting worse, which represents no real change since the last time that AP-NORC asked this question last year (58%).

Meanwhile, just 13% say that the federal government should have “no role” in combatting climate change.

Americans support a range of specific federal policies to help address climate change, though support has dipped in the last few years. AP-NORC finds that Americans are more likely to support than oppose the federal government taking each of the following actions to help address climate change:

AP-NORC also asked about several of these policies in 2022. They find slight dips since that previous survey in support for the government funding projects to reduce inequalities in climate impacts (-3), providing consumer rebates for more efficient home appliances (-4), and reducing companies’ greenhouse gas emissions (-5%). 

Declines in support for solar installation tax credits (-9) and EV tax credits (-13) since 2022 are more pronounced. 

Even with recent declines in support, Americans support expanding solar and wind more than fossil fuels. AP-NORC finds that 52% of Americans want to expand solar panel farms in the U.S. (down from 66% in 2022) and 44% want to expand offshore wind farms (down from 59% in 2022).

Even with these recent declines, Americans are far more likely to say that solar panel farms (52% expanded / 32% neither expanded nor reduced / 16% reduced) and offshore wind farms (44% expanded / 37% neither expanded nor reduced / 18% reduced) should be expanded than scaled back.

Americans are also more likely to support the expansion of solar and offshore wind than the expansion of fossil fuel extraction, including either offshore drilling for oil and gas (33% expanded / 38% neither expanded nor reduced / 28% reduced) or coal mining (23% expanded / 38% neither expanded nor reduced / 38% reduced).

AP-NORC finds that the drops in support for solar and wind expansion since 2022 are driven more by Democrats and independents than Republicans. In their data, support for solar expansion has dropped by 15 points among Democrats, by 18 points among independents, and by 6 points among Republicans. Similarly, declines in support for offshore wind expansion in their data are far greater among Democrats (-17) and independents (-19) than among Republicans (-7).

These partisan shifts are quite different from what we’ve seen in other polls this year. Pew, for example, has found declining Republican support for solar and wind expansion but steady support from Democrats–which is consistent with the broader trend in recent years of increased political polarization around clean energy. While the trendlines in AP-NORC’s data are troubling, we’d need to see more evidence to conclude that Democrats’ enthusiasm for solar and wind is softening.

Amid Trump’s threats to eliminate FEMA, the public overwhelmingly says that the federal government should have a major role in handling weather disasters. Large majorities of Americans say that the federal government should have a “major” role in each of the following:

The notion that the federal government should have a major role in disaster preparedness and response is also not particularly partisan, with 79%+ of Democrats and 68%+ of Republicans saying that the federal government should have a “major” role in each of these areas.

This data shows that Americans strongly resist the idea of the federal government pulling back from disaster response duties, as Trump is threatening to do by shutting down FEMA. On that point, Yale and George Mason found last month that three-quarters of voters (75%) oppose eliminating FEMA.

Under Trump, Americans have low confidence that the federal government is protecting clean air and water. Less than one in five say that they are “extremely” or “very” confident in the federal government’s ability to ensure safe water and air, and Americans also have little faith in the government to protect food safety. 

Below are Americans’ ratings of their confidence in the federal government to ensure the safety of these items:

Data for Progress – Voters are troubled to hear that the EPA is ending regulations on carbon dioxide and mercury pollution from power plants, as bipartisan majorities say that these rules should be kept in place [Article, Crosstabs]

Voters across party lines support current EPA limits on carbon dioxide and mercury pollution from power plants and say that these rules should be kept in place. Around two-thirds say that they support current EPA rules to limit mercury pollution from coal-fired power plants (69% support / 15% oppose) and carbon dioxide pollution from coal and gas-fired power plants (66% support / 18% oppose). This includes majority support across the political spectrum, with 66% of Republicans in favor of current rules for mercury pollution and 61% of Republicans in favor of current roles for carbon dioxide pollution.

By wide margins, voters also agree that rules to reduce mercury pollution from coal-fired power plants (62% kept in place / 19% repealed) and rules to reduce carbon dioxide pollution from coal and gas-fired power plants (59% kept in place / 22% repealed) should be kept in place rather than repealed. This again includes majorities of Republicans, 58% of whom say that the EPA should maintain its rules to limit mercury pollution and 54% of whom say that the EPA should maintain its rules to reduce carbon dioxide pollution.

The large majority of voters, including Republicans, are concerned to hear about the EPA’s plans to end power plant pollution regulations. After reading that “the head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced that the EPA is ending current regulations that limit the amount of carbon dioxide and mercury pollution that coal and gas-fired power plants can emit into the air,” around three-quarters of voters (74%) say that they are at least “somewhat” concerned about the EPA ending these regulations–including majorities of Democrats (84%), independents (77%), and Republicans (64%).

The Economist + YouGov – Many major provisions of Republicans’ budget plans are unpopular, including ending tax credits for clean energy [Topline, Crosstabs]

The elimination of clean energy tax credits ranks as one of many unpopular components of the reconciliation bill, though Americans are more amenable to ending tax credits for EVs. The Economist and YouGov asked about several of the components in congressional Republicans’ reconciliation bill and other budget plans, finding that many provisions are deeply unpopular. It’s also worth noting that the poll didn’t ask about directly cutting health care funding, which consistently rates as the most unpopular aspect of the reconciliation bill.

Below are the margins of support for each of the policies that The Economist and YouGov asked about:

American Energy American Jobs (AEAJ) – Voters in Republican-held states and districts say that they would be less likely to vote to re-elect members of the U.S. House and Senate who vote to end federal energy investments, as voters are concerned that eliminating these investments would cost jobs and raise energy bills [Summary Memo, Links to state- and district-specific memos]

There is widespread support for threatened federal energy investments in Republican-held states and districts, including among Republican voters. In nine polls across three red-leaning states (IN, KS, and OH) and six Republican-held congressional districts (AZ-6, CO-8, IA-1, NV-2, PA-1, and VA-2) for AEAJ, Republican polling firm Meeting Street Strategies finds resistance across the political spectrum to clean energy rollbacks. 

Pulling from their summary memo:

“There is broad support for keeping energy investments in place. Across all nine surveys, there is widespread voter support — ranging from 75% (Ohio) to 79% (Kansas, IA-1, and PA-1) — for keeping the federal funding and tax incentives that help increase energy production, modernize and improve the electric grid, and expand advanced energy manufacturing. Voter support for eliminating federal energy investments is consistently low, ranging from just 11% to 15%…

Keeping these energy investments in place also receives bipartisan backing. These energy investments are not just broadly popular—they cut across party lines. Large majorities across the partisan spectrum support keeping these federal energy investments in place:

Voters say that they would be less likely to re-elect members of the U.S. House and Senate who vote to cut energy investments, as voters are concerned about the impacts of energy cuts on costs and jobs. Per the memo:

“The data highlights the political perils if Members of Congress eliminate these energy investments. A clear majority of voters in all nine surveys say they would be less likely to re-elect their Member of Congress or U.S. Senator if they voted to eliminate these energy-related investments. On the flip side, this data shows very little to gain by getting rid of these energy-related investments: only between 8% and 15% say they are more likely to re-elect their Member of Congress or U.S. Senator if they eliminated these investments.

There is deep concern about the economic consequences – both locally and nationally – if these investments are eliminated. Voters across all nine surveys voice broad concern over the potential fallout from eliminating these energy-related federal funding and tax incentives.

Messages focused on the economy and national security are winning arguments in these Republican-held areas. Pulling again from the memo:

“Voters believe and embrace the economic and national security rationale for maintaining these federal investments. Across the nine surveys, six out of ten voters agree with both of these arguments:

By contrast, barely a third of voters across these nine surveys agree with the argument for eliminating these investments (‘the federal government is spending too much, driving up the national debt, and getting too involved in an issue that should be left to the private sector and the marketplace to decide’).”

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