Sixty-five percent of Americans say the Nov. 6 results gave Obama a “mandate” on his proposal to raise tax rates on income over $250,000 and “to get it done.” Forty-five percent of Republicans agree.

The election “was basically a referendum that wealthy people could and would pay more,” said poll respondent Jim Johnson, 66, of Littleton, Colorado, a retired telecommunications executive and a Republican who voted for Mitt Romney. “It was perfectly clear. That was Obama’s stance throughout the election.”

Poll respondent Gerald Watts, 75, of Lake Quivira, Kansas, a retired engineer and another Republican who voted for Romney, read the election results the same way.

“Every time we listened to him on TV, he’d start talking about raising taxes on the rich — every news conference, every time he went up in front of a group,” said Watts. “He didn’t want to talk about anything else.”