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President Donald Trump’s pressure on Ukraine to investigate 2020 presidential challenger Joe Biden is increasingly drawing comparisons to former president Nixon’s Watergate scandal.
USA TODAY

WASHINGTON – A new poll shows that only four in 10 Republicans believe President Donald Trump talked to the Ukrainian president about investigating political rival Joe Biden, even though Trump has acknowledged doing so.

That compares with 85% of Democrats and 61% of independents surveyed by Monmouth University Poll who said Trump “probably did” mention the possibility of an investigation into the Biden family during a July phone call with Volodymyr Zelensky.

“This seems to be another example of partisan tribalism at work in public opinion,” said Patrick Murray, director of the independent Monmouth University Polling Institute.

The national survey was conducted Sept. 23-29, as the Ukraine story evolved.

Trump has repeatedly, without evidence, claimed that Biden as vice president tried to stop an investigation into a Ukrainian energy company where his son Hunter served on the board of directors. 

Trump directly acknowledged on Sept. 22 that he spoke with Zelensky about Biden, four days before the White House released a summary of the call. According to that reconstruction of the conversation, Trump told Zelensky there was “a lot of talk” about Biden’s son’s activities in Ukraine and that he was directing his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani and Attorney General William Barr to assist in the inquiry “to get to the bottom of it.”

“A lot of people want to find out about that so whatever you can do with the attorney general would be great,” Trump said.

Trump maintains there was nothing improper about that conversation. But its disclosure prompted House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to launch an impeachment investigation into whether Trump abused his authority by using his office for personal gain.

Democrats question whether Trump used congressionally approved military aid intended for Ukraine as leverage to push for an investigation of Biden.

More: Nancy Pelosi has put the Trump impeachment inquiry on a fast track. Here’s the plan, timeline and key players

More than six in ten of all adults surveyed by Monmouth said it is not appropriate for a U.S. president to make the type of request of a foreign leader that Trump did.  But only three in ten Republicans agreed with that statement.

And while about half of all adults (49%) said it’s a good idea for the House Judiciary Committee to conduct an impeachment inquiry, less than half (44%) said Trump should be impeached and compelled to leave the White House.

The public is divided on the veracity of Trump’s claim that Biden pressured Ukrainian officials to keep them from investigating his son’s business ties. About four in 10 said Biden probably did exert this pressure while nearly the same share said he probably did not.

“Trump may be facing backlash for this call but the irony is now that its contents are out there, it may actually help with his objective,” Murray said. “And that is to sow doubt about Biden among voters.”

More: Mitch McConnell: Senate would have ‘no choice’ but to hold trial if House votes to impeach Donald Trump

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President Richard Nixon appears on national television on Aug. 8, 1974 to announce his resignation. The Watergate scandal, which led to Nixon's resignation, changed the course of American history and the nature of the relationship between the citizenry and its government.
President Nixon gestures toward transcripts of White House tapes after announcing he would turn them over to House impeachment investigators and make them public in April of 1974.
Named in Watergate affair are from left to right: G. Gordon Liddy, White House Counsel John W. Dean III, Former Attorney General John N. Mitchell, and Former Deputy Canpaign Manager for Nixon's Re-election Jeb Stuart Magruder.
Rep. Peter Rodino Jr. (D-NJ) chairman of the House Judiciary Committee in Washington, DC, bangs the gavel to start the impeachment debate of Pres. Richard Nixon in this file photo from July 1974.
With news that President Nixon will resign, the New York Post is read on the corner by some people waiting for a bus in midtown New York City, Aug. 8, 1974.
Special Watergate prosecutor Archibald Cox sits in his Washington office as he reads U.S. District Judge John Sirica's order that President Nixon produce tapes of the White House conversations on Watergate, Aug. 29, 1973. In an incident known as the 'Saturday night massacre,' Cox was fired on President Nixon's orders on a Saturday night in 1973, hours after Cox held a news conference to defy him.
A smiling President Nixon gives a thumbs up as he walks from the podium in the East Room of the White House Aug. 9, 1974. Nixon's daughters Julie Nixon Eisenhower, left and Tricia Nixon Cox and son-in-law Edward Cox follow.
President Nixon's chief of staff, Alexander Haig, leaves U.S. District Court, Dec. 6, 1973 in Washington, after telling Judge John Sirica that Nixon was "very, very disturbed" at hearing three weeks ago that 18 minutes of a subpoenaed Watergate tape had been obliterated. Behind Haig at left is Leonard Garment, a White House lawyer.
President Nixon tells a White House news conference that he will not allow his legal counsel, John Dean, to testify on Capitol Hill in the Watergate investigation and challenged the Senate to test him in the Supreme Court, March 15, 1973.
John Dean III, former White House aide in the Nixon Administration, adjusts his eyeglasses as he nears the end of reading his 245-page prepared statement before the Senate Watergate Committee in Washington, D.C., on June 25, 1973. In his seven-hour opening statement Dean said that the president was involved in the cover-up of the Watergate burglary.
Special Watergate prosecutor Archibald Cox is surrounded by newsmen outside D.C. District Court in Washington on Oct. 19, 1973, after ousted White House counsel John W. Dean III pleaded guilty to conspiring to obstruct the Watergate investigation.
Richard Nixon says goodbye with a victorious salute to his staff members outside the White House as he boards a helicopter after resigning the presidency on Aug. 9, 1974. Nixon was the first president in American history to resign the nation's highest office. His resignation came after approval of an impeachment article against him by the House Judiciary Committee for withholding evidence from Congress. He stepped down as the 37th president with a 2,026-day term, urging Americans to rally behind Gerald R. Ford. President Ford fully pardoned Nixon one month later.