Exploiting a Major Blunder to Study Policy Accountability: Trump and His Covid Stance in 2020

Abstract Most theories of democracy assume that voters punish politicians who pursue unpopular policies. However, empirical evidence supporting this claim remains elusive, partly because politicians strategically avoid adopting unpopular stances. The 2020 US presidential election offers a unique opportunity to investigate this phenomenon. Incumbent President Donald Trump publicly embraced unpopular positions on Covid-19, arguably the campaign’s most critical issue. Using panel survey data, we find many Trump supporters disagreed with his Covid-19 stances and preferred more aggressive government action, yet most remained unaware that his policies conflicted with their views even by the campaign’s end. Among those who recognized this contradiction, few defected; instead, many followed Trump, adjusting their own views to match his positions. Although our statistical power to detect voter defections is limited—precisely because learning about his stance was uncommon—Trump’s unpopular positions may still have been decisive given the narrow election margin. Broadly, voters’ failure to perceive or acknowledge conflicts between their policy views and those of favored candidates constrains their ability to hold politicians accountable, highlighting a critical challenge for democratic accountability.