People often vote based on who’s already in the White House. In 2008, public opinion of the Bush administration played a major role, influencing both the campaigns of the candidates and the resulting votes. But sometimes, it’s more complicated than that. Take 2000 for example, when incumbent Vice President Al Gore — who served with President Clinton, who had both high approval ratings but was also impeached — lost to George W. Bush.

So how does the incumbent party affect elections? And how is President Obama’s legacy influencing the current campaign? Professors Julian Zelizer and Sam Wang debate this issue and more in episode three of Politics & Polls. 

Zelizer is the Malcolm Stevenson Forbes, Class of 1941 
Professor of History and Public Affairs at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. He has been one of the pioneers in the revival of American political history. He is the author of several books including, most recently, "The Fierce Urgency of Now: Lyndon Johnson, Congress, and the Battle for the Great Society." Zelizer is a frequent commentator in the international and national media on political history and contemporary politics. He has published over six hundred op-eds, including his weekly column on CNN.com. 

Wang is professor of neuroscience and molecular biology at Princeton University. He is known for his books "Welcome to Your Brain" and "Welcome to Your Child's Brain" and for his founding role at the Princeton Election Consortium, a blog providing U.S. election analyses. In 2004, Wang was one of the first to aggregate U.S. presidential polls using probabilistic methods. In 2012, his statistical analysis correctly predicted the presidential vote outcome in 49 of 50 states. He has also developed new statistical standards for partisan gerrymandering. A neuroscientist, Wang's academic research focuses on the neuroscience of learning, the cerebellum, and autism.