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79% Think Barrett’s Senate Confirmation Is Likely

Voters aren’t convinced that federal Judge Amy Coney Barrett should sit on the U.S. Supreme Court, but a sizable majority expects her to be confirmed by the Senate.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that 79% of Likely U.S. Voters think Barrett is likely to be confirmed as a Supreme Court justice, with 54% who say it’s Very Likely. (To see survey question wording, click here.)

This compares to 83% and 47% respectively for Judge Brett Kavanaugh just after President Trump announced his nomination in July 2018 and 86% and 52% respectively for Judge Neil Gorsuch, Trump’s first high court pick, in February 2017. 

These findings are also comparable to initial voter attitudes just after President Obama named both of his choices for the Supreme Court – Judge Sonia Sotomayor and former Solicitor General Elena Kagan

Also similar to what we’ve seen in initial surveying on past Supreme Court nominees, 39% of voters think the Senate should confirm Barrett based on what they know at this time. Forty-nine percent (49%) say she should not be confirmed, but 12% are undecided.

Predictably, 76% of Republicans believe the Senate should confirm the GOP president’s latest nominee. Seventy-five percent (75%) of Democrats and 53% of voters not affiliated with either major party oppose her confirmation. But 76% of Democrats and 71% of unaffiliated voters agree with 90% of Republicans that the Senate is likely to confirm Barrett.

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The survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted September 27, 2020 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.

Republicans overwhelmingly want Trump to fill the Supreme Court seat vacated by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, but among all voters, just over half think he should leave the position vacant for the winner of the presidential election to fill.

Forty percent (40%) of all voters have a favorable opinion of Barrett, while 42% view her unfavorably. This includes 29% with a Very Favorable opinion and 27% with a Very Unfavorable one. Notable at this early stage of the confirmation process is the 18% who don’t know enough about the president’s latest Supreme Court nominee to voice any kind of opinion of her.

While 73% of Republicans have a favorable view of Barrett who was nominated by the president on Saturday, just 16% of Democrats and 33% of unaffiliated voters agree. But 20% of both Democrats and unaffiliateds are not sure what they think of Barrett, compared to just 13% of GOP voters.

Men are more supportive of Barrett than women are and more convinced that she will be confirmed. The older the voter, the more likely they are to believe that the Senate will confirm her nomination.

Seventy-six percent (76%) of self-identified conservative voters think Barrett should be confirmed, a view shared by only 21% of moderates and 12% of liberals.

Sixty-five percent (65%) of all voters rated the Senate’s handling of the Kavanaugh nomination as poor. Those hearings included last-minute, unsubstantiated charges of sexual violence and harassment against the nominee by Democratic senators.

During the partisan sparring over the Kavanaugh nomination, 62% of voters said it is not possible for Trump to find a Supreme Court nominee that the majority of both Republicans and Democrats would support.

Additional information from this survey and a full demographic breakdown are available to Platinum Members only.

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The survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted September 27, 2020 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.

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