Even before impeachment, the coronavirus pandemic and economic recession, a majority of Donald Trump supporters had already decided they would support his re-election effort in November 2020.
A new poll conducted for Newsweek by Redfield and Wilson Monday found that 54 percent of likely Trump voters decided more than a year ago they would back the president this election cycle. Just nine percent of respondents said they decided to vote for Trump sometime in the past month.
The results were similar for the Joe Biden campaign, as 48 percent of likely Biden voters decided they were going to vote for the Democratic nominee more than a year ago—even before the former vice president officially launched his candidacy. Just 7 percent of likely Biden voters made up their minds sometime in the past month.
Of the remaining Trump supporters, 11 percent decided how they would vote between one month and three months ago; 12 percent between three and six months ago; and 11 percent between six months and a year ago. For likely Biden voters, 11 percent made up their minds between one month and three months ago; 18 percent between three and six months ago; and 12 percent between six months and a year ago.
That a plurality of voters already made their decision about the 2020 election is one possible explanation for the fact that poll numbers for Biden and Trump are roughly the same today as they were several months ago.
As of September 28, the FiveThirtyEight polling average showed Biden ahead of Trump by a margin of almost 7.1 percentage points. Go back six months and the race was in the same place: Biden led by 6.8 points on March 20.
While polling institutes had their problems with the 2016 election, experts recently told Newsweek that 2020 is nowhere near as uncertain as the race was four years ago. They said the movable or persuadable portion of today's electorate is less than half the size it was four years ago.
Even a monumental Supreme Court vacancy may not be enough to sway people ahead of Election Day. President Trump and Senate Republicans are moving full steam ahead with the nomination of conservative Judge Amy Coney Barrett following the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Both sides of the aisle have claimed that the judicial nomination process would energize their base of supporters. Vice President Mike Pence has been presenting a new pitch while out on the campaign trail in recent weeks, pledging that "four more years means more judges." Democrats have seen a surge in online fundraising: ActBlue, a liberal fundraising platform, announced that in the day after Ginsburg's death they received more than $91 million in contributions.
But according to the poll, 83 percent of respondents said they haven't changed their minds on whether or how they are voting due to the opening of a Supreme Court. Seventeen percent of those polled said they have.
The polling data of the 3,000 registered voters from all political affiliations across the U.S. was collected through an online survey created by Redfield & Wilton Strategies. The pollster group is a member of the British Polling Council (BPC) and the American Association for Public Opinion Research (AAPOR) Transparency Initiative.
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
About the writer
Alexandra Hutzler is currently a staff writer on Newsweek's politics team. Prior to joining Newsweek in summer 2018, she was ... Read more
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