More than half of Joe Biden’s supporters are primarily motivated to vote for the president to prevent a return of Donald Trump to the White House, a new poll shows.
Opposition to Trump is the top reason to support Biden for 54% of Democratic incumbent voters, the new CBS/YouGov poll found, compared to 47% in a similar survey conducted in March, before the presumptive Republican nominee was found guilty of corporate fraud by a New York jury.
Another 27% of Biden voters support the president because they like him — up from 31% in March — while 19% say they support him because he is the Democratic nominee for president.
The poll comes as the Biden campaign has stepped up its rhetoric by directly attacking Trump in recent weeks, pointing to the former president’s felony conviction and a series of past controversies. Last week, Biden said his predecessor is “reckless and dangerous” as he complained that his New York trial was rigged and claimed he had gone “crazy” over his 2020 election loss.
The outcome of this year’s presidential election remains uncertain, with the new CBS poll showing Biden and Trump essentially tied nationally and in key swing states. Trump has 50% of support among likely voters, and Biden has 49%, with these numbers swapped for likely voters in battleground states.
Trump has held a lead over Biden in most polls in recent months, although there are indications of a slight shift toward the president in the wake of his predecessor’s felony conviction. Trump, who faces three other criminal cases for hoarding classified documents and trying to undermine the 2020 election, is tentatively scheduled to be sentenced in the New York case on July 11.
However, the CBS poll found that 55% of likely voters say Trump’s beliefs will not be a factor in their choice for president, while 28% say it will be an important factor. Although Trump has had a huge post-trial fundraising campaign among his supporters, the poll found that only 14% of his voters support him over his conviction, while the vast majority say it is not a factor for them.
Eight in 10 Trump voters incorrectly believe the former president was charged because of the Biden administration’s actions and not because of local prosecutors, the poll found.
Overall, the top motivating issues for voters are the state of the U.S. economy, inflation, the health of democracy and crime, the poll found.
