New polling raises fresh concerns for Donald Trump following his recent felony convictions.
The presumptive Republican presidential nominee was found guilty last month by a jury on 34 felony counts, and a Politico-Ipsos poll shows 21 percent of independent voters said the conviction made them less likely to support Trump and that his criminal record would be an important factor in their vote.
"[The] criminal conviction didn’t instantly upend the 2024 presidential race," reported Politico Magazine. "But the results of a new poll should be worrying for Trump."
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A sizable number – 46 percent – agreed the conviction was the result of a fair and impartial judicial process, and 51 percent of respondents rejected Trump's claims that the prosecution was brought to help president Joe Biden's re-election campaign, while less than a third – 29 percent – believed the president was directly involved and only 25 percent said they weren't sure.
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Slightly more than a third of respondents – 36 percent – believed the Department of Justice was directly involved in the Manhattan district attorney's decision to prosecute the ex-president, while 34 percent said they didn't know whether that was true, although there's no evidence to support that view.
About a quarter of respondents – 22 percent – said the conviction would be important in their voting decision and would make them less likely to support Trump, while only 6 percent said the conviction was important and made them more likely to support him.
That number was nearly the same, at 21 percent, for independents who said the conviction was important and made them less likely to support him, while only 5 percent of independents said the conviction made them more likely to back his re-election bid.
