Ever since Donald Trump was indicted a second time, it’s been assumed that having a criminal record made him stronger, not weaker, among Republican voters. But maybe that’s not true. A new poll suggests that maybe those 37 charges against him — charges that very well likely could land him in the slammer — might be starting to make conservatives wonder if he should be president again.
On Tuesday, CNN released the results of a poll that showed Trump’s support amongst GOP voters had dipped six percent from a poll taken at this time last month. In May, the former president commanded 53% of the vote amongst other Republican candidates. Now he’s down to 47%.
What changed? For one thing, there’s that second indictment. What’s more, since the charges were filed, a lot of information has come that make it look like he really did mishandle classified government information — the very crime he’s long and falsely accused Hillary Clinton of committing. Surely it’s not helping that he keeps basically confessing to doing crimes.
Mind you, 47% is still pretty good. His closest competitor, Ron DeSantis, is way behind him at 26%. While Trump’s polling sank, Mike Pence actually saw his returns jump by 6%, which almost makes it seem like the people dumping Trump are switching to his former veep (who he almost got killed).
There was another part of the CNN poll that didn’t bode well for the big guy. Of the 1,350 people who participated, 61% approved of the move to hit him with federal charges. A whopping 55% said Trump “acted illegally” with regards to the classified documents, while 57% agreed that he “risked national security.” On top of all this, 59% thought Trump should “end his campaign now.”
Trump won’t do that, as he’s vowed to stay in the race through thick and thin. Even he may be realizing that he really might have to do his campaigning from the clink.
(Via CNN)