Major crises can threaten political regimes by empowering demagogues and promoting authoritarian rule. The central question is whether such crises increase mass support for the president’s institutional authority during the coronavirus/COVID-19 pandemic.

🔊 📊 National Survey Experiment:

• An experiment was embedded in a national survey of more than 8,000 U.S. adults during the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Treatments randomly varied whether policies were described as implemented via unilateral presidential power or through the legislative process.
• Pandemic severity was measured at three levels—state, local, and individual—to test whether greater severity made respondents more accepting of executive authority.

🔎 What Was Found:

• No evidence that the public evaluated policies differently when they were implemented unilaterally by the president versus through the legislative process.
• No moderation of attitudes by pandemic severity at the state, local, or individual level.
• Partisan and ideological orientations were consistently strong predictors of policy attitudes, dominating any institutional framing effects.

⚖️ Why It Matters:

• These findings run against the expectation that emergencies automatically weaken checks and boost public appetite for stronger executive power.
• Perhaps paradoxically, elite and mass polarization appear to limit the opportunity for crises to increase public acceptance of strengthened presidential authority, suggesting polarization constrains—even during major emergencies—shifts in public support for institutional change.