Trump’s The Choice For Voters Who’ve Experienced Violent Protests

Three-out-of-four voters who’ve had violent anti-police protests in their community rate those protests important to their vote in the presidential election. Among these voters, a sizable majority like the job President Trump is doing.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that 42% of Likely U.S. Voters have had anti-police protests in their community this summer. (To see survey question wording, click here.) 

Nearly half (48%) of these voters say the protests in their community have turned violent.

Among all voters, 65% say the violent protests are important to their vote in the presidential election this fall, with 41% who say it’s Very Important.

Among those who have had violent protests in their community, even more (76%) rate them important to their vote, including 54% who say they are Very Important. Sixty-three percent (63%) of these voters Strongly Approve of the job Trump is doing versus 35% who Strongly Disapprove.

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The survey of 1,000 Likely U.S. Voters was conducted September 9-10, 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.

The protests champion defunding police departments and using that money for social programs. But 66% of Americans oppose defunding the police in the community where they live. Sixty-one percent (61%) believe violent crime is likely to go up in communities that defund the police.

Blacks (72%) and other minority voters (69%) place only slightly more importance on the protests from a voting standpoint than whites (63%) do, even though the overall focus of them has been police treatment of minorities.

Other minorities are more likely than blacks and whites to have experienced violent protest in their community. Those under 40 have shared that experience more than their elders have.

Fifty-five percent (55%) of Republicans say the violent protests are Very Important to their vote in the upcoming presidential election, compared to 35% of Democrats and 33% of voters not affiliated with either major party.

Most voters view the ongoing violent protests against police as primarily criminal in nature and think they will only make the criminal justice system in America worse.

Voters think big city leaders in places like Portland and Seattle where violent protests have gone on for weeks are bringing the violence on themselves, with most reporters cheering on the protesters.

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

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