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Voters think Trump should face charges even if he wins the election: poll

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Voters think Trump should face charges even if he wins the election: poll

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WASHINGTON — A majority of Americans think it would be “wrong” for Donald Trump to have the Justice Department drop federal charges against him if he wins back the White House, according to a new USA TODAY/Suffolk University poll.

Legal observers say there is no chance Trump’s Justice Department will pursue the two federal cases he asked judges to dismiss as a “witch hunt” led by a prosecutor he calls “deranged.” But nearly 58% of likely voters who responded to the poll said it would be “wrong” for Trump to order the department to drop the charges, compared with 30% who said it would be the “right” thing to do. Almost one in ten were undecided.

A similar majority, 56%, said federal and state prosecutors should continue to pursue charges against Trump if he loses to Vice President Kamala Harris on Nov. 5, compared with 38% who oppose it, the poll found. . Almost 5% were undecided.

The survey of 1,000 likely voters, conducted by landline and cell phone between October 14 and 18, has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.

Some voters spoke about the importance of treating Trump like any other person accused of a crime.

“For him to dismiss the charges against himself or put someone in there who will dismiss them is almost a greater crime than what he actually did,” said Steve Morrissey, 60, an engineer from Omaha, Nebraska, who supports Harris. “No one should be above the law. I should move forward like anyone else.”

But the survey generated responses as polarized as the campaign. Some voters worried about the chaos and uncharted territory of having criminal charges pending against the president while he is in office.

Cullie Gentry, 35, of Rankin, Texas, who works in the oil fields and supports Trump, said it would be best to drop the charges against the former president whether he wins or loses.

“I absolutely think he should get rid of these charges,” Gentry said. “It’s dangerous. We live like a Third World country, where your political opponent is prosecuted.”

Pending cases against Trump include:

Responses to the USA TODAY/Suffolk University poll followed other polls that found voters worried that Trump had broken the law and that it could affect their votes.

A Pew Research Center poll in September found that 46% of voters said Trump broke the law to change the outcome of the 2020 election, and another 14% said he did something wrong but did not break the law. .

An ABC News poll conducted in May revealed that half of respondents (52%) considered New York’s silencing accusations against Trump to be significant, with one in five saying they would reconsider their support for him if convicted. Trump was convicted later that month.

Trump’s lawyers have argued that if he wins the election, any trial will have to wait until he finishes serving his term. The judges in the cases have not yet ruled on this issue. Trump also said he could pardon himself or fire the prosecutor, Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith, in the two federal cases.

Marcy Michaels, a retired nurse from Verona, Pennsylvania, who supports Trump, said she believes the charges would be dropped if he lost because she believes they were aggressively pursued to prevent Trump from campaigning for re-election. She said she doubts Smith would have filed charges if someone else had been the Republican candidate, although Smith and Attorney General Merrick Garland have said the charges were the result of following the facts and the law.

“I think the aggressiveness of pursuing these charges was directly related to how well he was doing in the polls to become the nominee,” Michaels said. “Unfortunately, I think it’s politically motivated.”

Windy Rhoads, a temp worker from Santa Cruz County, California, who supports Harris, said she hopes Trump will pressure the Justice Department to drop the charges if he is elected. But she would like to see the federal election interference trial move forward.

“I think this case is very strong. He incited a coup and invited people to show up on January 6th,” Rhoads said. “I believe he would have gone to the Capitol with them if the Secret Service had allowed it.” Trump’s driver on January 6, 2021, testified before a Congressional committee that Trump asked to be taken to the Capitol that day, but the Secret Service stopped him.

Mara Mamerow, a software developer in Milwaukee who supports Harris, said she has trouble imagining how a president could serve with criminal charges hanging over him.

“Do I think he should have these charges prosecuted? Yes,” said Mamerow. “But I can’t understand it.”

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