Each month, Gallup provides a party ID update. It's pretty straight-forward, asking the question "what party do you ID with - if any".
Here's where we were on Election Day 2016:
36 percent Independents
31 percent Democrats
27 percent Republicans
6 percent third party
Last month:
42 percent Independents
31 percent Democrats
24 percent Republicans
3 percent third party
And today:
42 percent Independents
30 percent Democrats
25 percent Republicans
3 percent third party
Clearly people aren't clamoring for either political party as we head down the home stretch of 2017. Republicans did post a small win in the month as they flipped 1 percent back from Democrats, though they still are posting a 5 percent deficit in party ID.
It's notable that Democrats haven't capitalized on the defections (at least not directly at this point) which is an important point in this conversation and a potential lost opportunity.
Despite the anti-Trump furor in Democrat ranks and throughout much of the media - there are actually 1 percent fewer Democrats today than on Election Day a year ago and from October.
Throughout the year it's been clear that Republicans had suffered losses as progress wasn't being made on the biggest agenda items identified by voters in January (healthcare and taxes). With Republicans on the precipice of meaningful tax reform that has the potential to deliver on a key piece of the healthcare promise, the end of the individual mandate, they actually could be getting their act together in time to rally in advance of the 2018 midterms.
That's a big if that's predicated on actually delivering...