Just in case you haven’t heard, Donald Trump has been in the news a bit this week.
His most recent comments about Muslims – now he’s calling for the U.S. to ban all Muslims from entering the country (“temporarily,” at least) – have drawn criticisms, rebukes, denunciations and condemnations from political leaders in both parties.
But what do voters think?
A new survey from Public Policy Polling finds that a plurality of North Carolina Republicans agree with many of Trump’s ideas. 48 percent of GOP voters say Muslims should be required to register for a national database, with only 33 percent opposed. 42 percent believe Trump’s claim that “thousands of Arabs cheered” in Jersey City while witnessing the 9/11 attacks, while only 26 percent say they don’t believe that happened. And 35 percent of GOP voters say all the mosques in the U.S. should be shut down; only 33 percent say they’d oppose such a thing.
Those measures find their strongest support among Trump voters – 67 percent in favor of a national database, 51 percent in favor of shutting down mosques – but they’re getting support from non-Trump voters too. Among Ted Cruz voters, there’s more support than opposition for a national database (43-31) and a forced shutdown of mosques (41-28). Supporters of Marco Rubio and Ben Carson, the other two frontrunners in the GOP race, are less likely to support those measures – but even there, more than a third of Rubio and Carson supporters favor a national database and more than a quarter favor a mosque shutdown. (Rubio, Carson and Cruz have all voiced opposition to Trump’s most recent remarks – but with notably less fervor than some of the candidates who are polling lower.)
PPP director Tom Jensen says those numbers suggest that Trump won’t lose support by making inflammatory statements about Muslims – he may even gain support. “Trump’s Islamophobia is a central feature of his appeal,” says Jensen. (This survey was conducted before the latest firestorm, but a survey from Bloomberg indicates nearly two-thirds of GOP voters want to ban Muslims from entering the country. Even some Democrats – 18 percent – say they agree too.)
Jensen spoke Wednesday with WCHL’s Aaron Keck.
PPP’s poll also found that Trump still holds a sizable lead among North Carolina Republicans in the race for the GOP nomination, with 33 percent support against only 16 percent for second-place Ted Cruz and 14 percent each for Rubio and Carson. (Cruz is gaining, though – his support in North Carolina was only 6 percent in October.) Hillary Clinton is maintaining a big lead over Bernie Sanders on the Democratic side. Most of the GOP contenders hold a slight edge over Clinton in a hypothetical general election.
The survey also found GOP incumbent Pat McCrory regaining a slight lead over Democratic challenger Roy Cooper, 44-42, in the race for governor. (Cooper had a slight lead in the October poll, but the two have been running within the margin of error in polls all year.) U.S. Senator Richard Burr holds 11-point leads over his likely Democratic challengers, but Jensen says that’s largely because those challengers (Deborah Ross, Kevin Griffin) are still fairly unknown. Burr himself is still fairly unpopular, with only a 33 percent approval rating, so he could be vulnerable in 2016 if there’s a strong Democratic challenger.
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