We all change our minds; it’s part of evolving as people. Developing a more open mind is always a good thing in my book.
And when it comes to political issues, we usually have some help. There’s virtually always an active effort to nudge, even yank, public sentiment in one direction or another.
Americans, for example, didn’t wake up one day and support gay couples getting married. It took a couple of decades of constant work movement leaders to persuade the country it was the right thing to do and passed constitutional muster. Over time polls jumped an astounding 20 points. Such supermajority support was the driver that led to 36 states legalizing gay marriage before the U.S. Supreme Court made it the law of the land in 2015.
The political wedge lost its edge.
Since then support for marriage equality has only been increasing. In these partisan times, that’s impressive.
There have been a couple of initial signs, however, that the far right, which always been opposed to same-sex marriage and LGBT people generally, has been hard at work.
Polling support among republicans
Alex lundry
It’s one poll, but xxxx. Conventional wisdom says it’s the influence of younger men…..
Where far right has been successful in moving the needle
Here are three issue areas where the far right has gained traction when it comes to persuading people to believe something. It doesn’t matter if it's true or not. The point is how powerful persuasion, done properly, can be. (Note: I’m not talking about a change in policy in all cases. I’m talking about a change in a sizeable portion of what Americans believe—or say they believe to pollsters (a whole topic for another day).
On Election Integrity
There should be no doubts that the U.S. election system is secure, free, and fair. Intelligence officials and Republican lawmakers have studied the issue and never found anything.
Most Americans don’t believe the lie that the 2020 presidential election was stolen, but a striking number do. MAGA politicians have successfully raised doubts about election integrity. The "rigged" and "stolen" election storyline is a shining example of completely making something up and spoon feeding it to people often enough. It is one of those most successful campaigns to move public opinion from zero people believing something to millions. A YouGov survey earlier this year found 50% of Republicans and 9% of Democrats believe the 2020 election was "rigged."
The lie continues to be fueled ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. The president continues to claim the election six years ago was stolen at least 108 times in 2026, according to a Reuters analysis.
On Immigration
Legal and undocumented immigration is one of MAGA’s winning issues; they’ve been talking about it nonstop for 10 years. Democrats seem to have either avoided the issue, hoping it would go away, or have splintered off into different policy directions. Even after getting clobbered on the issue in the 2024 presidential campaign, Democrats have no unified immigration policy, much less a message.
“If Democrats had a very clear, solution- oriented stance on immigration, they would be contrasting Trump’s extremism with their pragmatism, and that’s a debate Democrats can win,” Frank Sharry, a veteran advocate for immigrants and an immigration overhaul said late last year about the immigration raids.
On Vaccines
The campaign against science and scientists isn’t new. But in recent years a pocket of the right wing, including Steve Bannon, Roger Stone, and Elon Musk, targeted Dr. Peter Hotez, the renowned pediatrician in Houston. The anti-vaxxers political movement has grown and begun to shift a slice of public opinion against vaccines. The percentage of Americans who believed childhood vaccinations was important plummeted by 18 points in five years—from 2019 to 2024.
Moving Forward
The question moving forward is Can the other side of these and other policy issues get a footing? The answer is yes. Narratives are almost always changeable, if not reversible. A new narrative can knock the old one off the radar if there’s enough sustained messaging and media amplification.
As parts of the conservative legal establishment continue to challenge marriage at the U.S. Supreme Court and at the state level, marriage equality leaders would be wise to restart their machine to shore up support among Republicans.