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New from me @UpshotNYT: survey experiment I conducted gauging voter reactions to greater leftist rhetoric + policies coming from Dem candidates this primary season. Progressive turn solidifies Dem support, but there's backlash among Independents. Thread: nytimes.com/2019/09/30/ups…
A dominant theme of the first few Democratic debates was the leftward turn taken by candidates on a national stage, and what were the possible implications of this embrace of various progressive policies -- see some example headlines here: 
Political science research (andrewbenjaminhall.com/Hall_APSR.pdf, nyu.edu/projects/polit…) suggests such extremism would be punished by voters, and that's informed speculation on reactions to current Dem rhetoric. But we still lack good contemporary evidence on how reactions play out.
One simple but telling way to get at this: randomly expose voters to info about leftist rhetoric in a survey and measure subsequent reactions. I administered this procedure to 4k people on the Civis Analytics online panel (big thanks to @davidshor & @msadowsky for running this)..
..where a random half read about leftward turn (treatment) while other half read about unrelated info (control). I then asked 2020 vote choice, voting considerations for Dem candidate, and how mobilized people felt for or against the Dem candidate. Vignettes + outcomes here:
Biggest result: exposure to info about leftward turn causes Independents to move 6 % pts away from the eventual Democratic nominee -- in other words, backlash materializes. Also notable given vote choice usually is not malleable. Dem and Rep respondents don't move in response.
Leftist rhetoric does seem to harden Dem respondents' attachment to their party's nominee though (becoming even more strongly to consider voting D). But on my q that aims to gauge mobilization potential, I don't see movement among Dems (or others)--potential benefits are limited.
I discuss some caveats in the article (eg still a year's away). But early sign of backlash is clear, and I think this is an important finding to consider as we see liberalizing D candidate rhetoric and wonder how voters react.
Design/methods details here: agadjanianpolitics.wordpress.com/2019/09/30/wha…
Design/methods details here: agadjanianpolitics.wordpress.com/2019/09/30/wha…
And some added thoughts/replies to critiques on treatment construction:
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Just so I have it all in one place, some more details on thinking behind the treatments:
