Sustained congressional investigations into the president can seriously erode their popular support

Recent years have seen increasing concerns over the influence of presidents on the policymaking process, often bypassing Congress through the use of executive orders. But Congress may not be completely helpless in the face if an ‘imperial presidency’. In new research, Douglas Kriner and Erick Schickler have examined 3,500 investigative hearings from 1953 through 2006 and finds that sustained congressional investigations into the president can be as damaging to their approval rating as a fall in consumer confidence in the economy would be.