By Ariel Edwards-Levy, CNN

(CNN) — In the wake of the 2024 election, most supporters of the Democratic Party say it needs to make significant changes and that they feel “burned out” by politics, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS. The party faces its lowest ratings in more than 30 years.

Donald Trump’s return to office is also remolding the GOP, with a majority of the party’s backers now saying that support for the president-elect is central to being a Republican.

Those shifts are playing out against a broader backdrop of political unhappiness, with even Republicans far more likely to say they’re disappointed and frustrated by politics than to express optimism, inspiration, or pride.

A 58% majority of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents say that the Democratic Party needs major changes, or to be completely reformed, up from just 34% who said the same after the 2022 midterm elections, when the party retained control of the Senate but lost the House. Over that time, the share of Republicans and Republican leaners who feel the same way about the GOP has ticked downward, from 38% to 28%.

Only 49% of Democratic-aligned adults say they expect their party’s congressional representatives to be even somewhat effective at resisting GOP policies, while more than 9 in 10 Republican-aligned adults expect their party’s congressional representatives — who now control both chambers of Congress — to be at least somewhat effective at passing new laws to enact their agenda.

But across party lines, the predominant political mood is one of discontent. Most adults in the US describe themselves as disappointed (70%) and frustrated (64%) with the nation’s politics today, with nearly half calling themselves burned out. About 4 in 10 say they’re angry, rising to 52% among Democratic-aligned women. Fewer than 20% say they’re optimistic, fired up, inspired or proud.

Only 23% of all registered voters say they’re satisfied with the influence people like them have on the political process, down from 38% in a poll taken last autumn — a decline that reflects rising dissatisfaction among voters in both parties. And only about half of all adults, 48%, say they’re confident that elections reflect the will of the people, although that’s actually an uptick from readings in the low 40s over the past three years. Confidence has undergone a partisan reversal in the wake of Trump’s electoral victory, soaring from 29% in July 2023 to 67% now among Republican-aligned adults, and dipping from 59% to 39% among Democratic-aligned adults over the same period of time.

Overall, just 33% of all Americans express a favorable view of the Democratic Party, an all-time low in CNN’s polling dating back to 1992. The GOP clocks in a tick higher, with a 36% favorability rating. Four years ago, in the immediate aftermath of the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, the Democrats’ rating stood at 49%, and the Republicans’ at 32%.

The majority of partisans remain generally positive about their own parties, but Republicans are more uniformly so, a main reason for the GOP’s slightly less negative numbers. A 78% majority of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents hold a favorable view of the GOP, while 72% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents view the Democratic Party favorably. Each party’s favorability ratings stand at just 19% among political independents.

Looking back over the last few years of politics, GOP-aligned adults say, 43% to 18%, that they now feel more a part of the Republican Party rather than less like a part of it. But among Democratic-aligned adults, the share who feel pushed away outnumber the share who feel pulled closer, 32% to 23%.

What do Americans want from their parties?

Most Americans on both sides of the aisle see their parties as more united than divided — 79% of Republican-aligned adults and 64% of Democratic-aligned adults say their parties are largely unified.

But internal divisions are a top complaint for both those Democrats and those Republicans who believe their parties need major changes or complete reform.

Among the majority of Democratic-aligned adults who want to see big changes in the party, other top issues include feeling that the party is out of touch or unresponsive, a desire for new leadership and a sense that the party has not been aggressive enough in pushing back against the GOP or needs to strengthen its message to voters.

“They are too nice,” wrote a Maryland man who responded to the poll. “Republicans will do anything to implement their goals (while) Democrats cling to ‘norms.’ They need to become more aggressive in their approach, but not lie like the Republicans.”

“Despite all the good things the Democratic Party has done for the country and its citizens, they lost the election,” an Arizona woman commented. “Democrats are horrible at messaging.”

Among the more modest share of Republicans and Republican-leaners who want to see significant change in the GOP, 10% mention Trump or MAGA, and just 4% say they see the party as too extreme or right-wing — down from 15% and 10%, respectively, in late 2022.

While some surveyed called on the party to “align themselves with policies that are not directly related to Trump” or to “develop good potential successors” to the president-elect, not all mentions of Trump were negative.

“Too many so called Republicans do not support President Trump for all he has been through and done for the country in the past 9 years,” wrote one poll respondent from Tennessee.

Asked whom they’d trust more in a disagreement between Trump and Republican congressional leaders, GOP-aligned adults side with Trump, 55% to 22%. (Among the American public as a whole, 53% say they’d trust neither, with the rest closely divided.)

And many of those aligned with the GOP view loyalty to Trump as central to their political identity. A 53% majority say that supporting Trump is a very important part of what being a Republican means to them.

That’s up from 34% who said the same in late summer 2021, months after the end of Trump’s first term. It also outpaces the share who now assign similar value to tenets like favoring a less powerful federal government (46%), supporting congressional Republicans (42%) or opposing Democratic policies (32%); only “holding conservative values and policy positions” (54%) carries similar weight.

Trump’s core backers — those who call their support for him a key part of their Republican identity — tend to be older than others in the party. They’re also more likely to describe themselves as conservatives, and less likely to hold college degrees.

Who should politicians try to help?

CNN polling last autumn found that most voters felt the government wasn’t doing enough to help people like them. The latest survey suggests that public perceptions about who each party is trying to help — and where they may be falling short — meaningfully differ.

While 35% of Americans say it’s a bigger problem that the Democratic Party isn’t trying to help enough people in the US, a similar 38% say the greater concern is that the party is trying to help too many of the wrong type of people — those who “don’t deserve it.” Another 26% say that neither is an issue.

By contrast, Americans say, 48% to 14%, that the GOP has a bigger problem with not trying to help broadly enough, rather than that they’re trying to help too many people who are undeserving, with 38% saying neither is a problem.

For most Democrats, it’s a core value that the government should do more to help people — 65% of Democratic-aligned adults say that belief is a very important part of what their party means to them, while fewer than half say the same about holding progressive positions, supporting Democratic elected officials, or opposing GOP policies.

But 36% say their party isn’t trying to help enough people, while a smaller 23% take issue with the type of people they view the party as trying to help. Younger Democrats and Democratic-leaners — those under 45 — say, 40% to 18%, that it’s more of a problem that the Democrats aren’t doing enough to help people than the kind of people they’re trying to help, while those 45 and older are more closely split between the two concerns, with 33% saying that not helping enough people is the bigger problem, and 27% that it’s helping those who are undeserving.

A 58% majority of Republican-aligned adults say that the Democratic Party is trying to help too many people who don’t deserve the assistance, while 62% say their own party has neither problem.

The CNN Poll was conducted by SSRS from January 9-12 among a random national sample of 1,205 adults drawn from a probability-based panel. Surveys were either conducted online or by telephone with a live interviewer. Results among the full sample have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.2 percentage points.

CNN’s Jennifer Agiesta and Edward Wu contributed to this report.

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