Whit Ayres’ comments to CNN regarding impeachment and views of President Trump:

“The whole impeachment debate has intensified preexisting feelings about the President,” says Republican pollster Whit Ayres. “Most people who like him do so with their eyes wide open. … They understand his strengths and his weaknesses and they prefer him to the alternatives as they see it. On the other hand, people who dislike him will be even more appalled because what they are seeing reinforces their existing views.”

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Ayres, the Republican pollster, says Trump’s unbending response to impeachment underlines the pugnacious take-no-prisoners posture that thrills his core supporters. 

“Supporters take away he’s a fighter, that he’s never backs down, that he never gives in to the carping critics and that he will stand his ground no matter what the situation and hold his head high in the face of unrelenting criticism,” he said.

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Whit Ayres’ comments in The New York Times regarding public opinion on impeachment:

Still, there are signs that the outlook for Mr. Trump is not improving. Support for impeaching the president has been growing among Americans who were once against it. Before the Ukraine revelations, said Whit Ayres, a Republican pollster, about 15 percent of Americans who disapproved of Trump’s job performance still opposed his impeachment and removal. 

“The Ukraine revelations are reducing that number,” he said, to 12 percent in the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll. “The progression of this story will likely make the impeachment inquiry numbers look much like Trump’s job approval numbers, with 40 to 45 percent opposing it and 55 to 60 percent supporting it,” Mr. Ayres added.

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