While Viewers Tune In To The Impeachment Hearings, So Far It's Not Changing Many Minds

PITTSBURGH (KDKA)-- Nearly 13 million people tuned in on television as the House impeachment inquiry got underway.

But is it having an impact on voter's views?

"I think people are paying attention," Lee Miringoff, director of the Marist Poll, told KDKA political editor Jon Delano on Wednesday.

"I think that doesn't mean that they're necessarily being persuaded by the discussions."

Miringoff, who conducted an NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist Poll between November 11 and November 15, says his polling shows that, so far at least, the impeachment hearings are reinforcing people's pre-conceived views.

Forty-five percent say the evidence makes them more likely to support impeachment, while 45 percent say it makes them likely to oppose it.

"This is a split along party lines, not unlike anything different than we've seen during the Trump administration."

Six in ten Americans say they are following the impeachment inquiry very or fairly closely, but not much is changing their views, according to the poll of 988 registered voters with a margin of error of 3.8 percent.

"This is all about reinforcement, about hardening of positions," said Miringoff.

"It's not about persuasion and changing people's minds. In fact, only 30 percent tell us that they are likely, under some circumstances, even conceive of changing their views on the impeachment proceedings."

But on one issue there is widespread agreement

Seventy percent say it is unacceptable for a president to ask a foreign leader to investigate a potential political opponent, while 22 percent say it's okay.

But is that impeachable?

Most Republicans still say no.

"Thirty-seven percent of Republicans say it is unacceptable for a president to do this, and yet just a handful want him to be impeached and removed."