GOP Faith in ’24 Vote Count Low After Years of Election Claims: Poll

NEWSMAX | Friday, 14 July 2023 04:02 PM EDT

Read more at https://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/2024-election-poll-voting-machines-confidence-trust/2023/07/14/id/1127194/

Few Republicans have high confidence that votes will be tallied accurately in next year’s presidential contest, suggesting years of sustained attacks against elections by former President Donald Trump and his allies have taken a toll, according to a new poll. The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll finds that only 22% of Republicans have high confidence that votes in the upcoming presidential election will be counted accurately compared to 71% of Democrats, underscoring a partisan divide fueled by a relentless campaign related to the 2020 presidential election. Even as he runs for the White House a third time, Trump continues to promote the claim that the election was stolen.

Overall, the survey finds that fewer than half of Americans – 44% — have “a great deal” or “quite a bit” of confidence that the votes in the next presidential election will be counted accurately. While Democrats’ confidence in elections has risen in recent years, the opposite is true for Republicans. Ahead of the 2016 election, 32% of Republicans were highly confident votes would be counted accurately — a figure that jumped to 54% two years later after Trump won the presidency. That confidence level dropped to 28% a month before the 2020 election, as Trump signaled to voters that the voting would be rigged, and now sits at 22% less than 16 months before the next presidential election.

“I just didn’t like the way the last election went,” said Lynn Jackson, a registered nurse from El Sobrante, California, who is a registered Republican. “I have questions about it. I can’t actually say it was stolen — only God knows that.”

Trump’s claims weren’t sustained by judges, including several he appointed, nor did audits and recounts confirm widespread tampering. Even so, Trump’s attempts to explain his loss led to a wave of new laws in GOP-dominated states that added new voting restrictions, primarily by restricting mail voting and limiting or banning ballot drop boxes. Across the country, some Republican-controlled local governments have explored banning machines from tallying votes in favor of hand counts.

The AP-NORC poll suggests that the persistent messaging has sunk in among a wide swath of the American public. The survey found that independents — a group that has consistently had low confidence in elections — were also largely skeptical about the integrity of the 2024 elections. Just 24% have the highest levels of confidence that the votes will be counted accurately.

Chris Ruff, a 46-year-old unaffiliated voter from Sanford, North Carolina, said he lost faith in elections years ago, believing they are rigged to favor certain candidates. He also sees no difference between the two major parties.

“I don’t vote at all,” he said. “I think it only adds credibility to the system if you participate.”

About four in 10 U.S. adults are highly confident that scanning paper ballots into a machine provides accurate counts. Democrats are about twice as confident in the process as Republicans —63% compared to 29%. That marks a notable shift from a 2018 AP-NORC poll that found just 40% of Democrats were confident compared to 53% of Republicans.uracy testing.

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