Support for U.S. Tea Party drops to new low in lead-up to 2016 elections: Gallup

Americans' support for the Tea Party has plummeted to a mere 17 percent, its lowest point ever, from a high of 32 percent in 2010, a Gallup poll released Monday found.

The Tea Party emerged on the U.S. political scene in 2009, grabbing international headlines in opposition to the fledgling administration of U.S. President Barack Obama.

The Tea Party is not a national political party, and most of its members consider themselves to be Republicans. They call for reducing national debt and budget deficit by slashing government spending and lowering taxes.

Support for the Tea Party peaked at 32 percent in November 2010, just after the mid-term elections, in which Tea Party supporters were widely credited with helping the Republican Party gain control of the U.S. House of Representatives, Gallup found.

As support gradually eroded over the next year, opponents of the Tea Party gained the upper hand. Since August 2012, support for the Tea Party has failed to reach 25 percent, and it has fallen below 20 percent in each of the last two polls, according to Gallup.

A majority, or 52 percent of Republican Party supporters supported the Tea Party movement in the 2010 polls, but now only 23 percent of them still support the movement, Gallup said.

Despite the dwindling popularity of the Tea Party movement, several Republicans elected to the House and Senate with Tea Party support have become major players on the national stage, including Republican presidential candidate Marco Rubio, a senator from Florida.

Moreover, if more Americans begin taking sides on the Tea Party over the next several months as the 2016 White House race heats up, there's more room for a return to support among Republicans than for an increase in opposition among Democrats, Gallup found. Enditem