Poll Finds Americans Deeply Concerned About Election Security, Integrity

A poll released Friday finds most Americans are deeply concerned about the security and integrity of elections, with only about a third having high confidence votes cast in the 2020 presidential election will be counted accurately.
The latest Associated Press-NOC Center for Public Affairs poll was conducted a week after FBI Director Christopher Wray told Congress Russia is still engaged in “information warfare” heading into the 2020 election, but that law enforcement has not seen efforts to target voting machines or other elections infrastructure.
“It never stopped. It happened in 2016, and it’s been continuing ever since then. It may have an uptick during an election cycle, but it is a 24/7, 365-days-a-year threat,” Wray told the House Judiciary Committee on Feb. 5.
But the poll suggests that even if Russia isn’t targeting voting infrastructure it may be achieving that goal because of the lack of voter confidence stemming from the 2016 election.
The poll, which was conducted Feb. 13-16, found Democrats were more likely than Republicans to express worries about the security of elections.
About 6-in-10 Democrats say they are very or extremely concerned that voting systems might be vulnerable to hackers.
Roughly two-thirds also are highly concerned that foreign governments will interfere in 2020 by tampering with results or influencing what Americans think about political candidates.
By contrast, fewer than half of Republicans express significant concern about hackers, and just about a quarter are highly concerned about any form of foreign interference.
Voter fraud and voter suppression also elicit a wide partisan divide. Nearly 7-in-10 Republicans show concerns about voter fraud, saying people voting who are not eligible is a major problem in U.S. elections. That compares with about a quarter of Democrats.
Meanwhile, Democrats are concerned about voter suppression. Almost two-thirds say it is a major problem that people who are eligible are not allowed to vote, while only about a third of Republicans say the same.
The opposing views come as Republicans in some states have implemented laws requiring voters to show identification, arguing that it will combat voter fraud. Democrats have fought many of those laws, saying they disenfranchise some voters.
Views on election integrity and security also divide along racial lines. Roughly two-thirds of black Americans say they have little confidence that votes in 2020 will be counted accurately, compared with fewer than 4 in 10 white Americans or Hispanics saying the same. Wide shares of black Americans, more so than white Americans or Hispanics, are concerned about hackers and foreign interference.
Nearly 8-in-10 black Americans also say it’s a major problem that people who are eligible are not allowed to vote.
The AP-NORC poll of 1,074 adults relies on a sample drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 4.2 percentage points.
In The News
Health
Voting
Opinion Polls

NEW YORK -- A groundbreaking “Back-to-Normal Barometer” survey for the first time finds that only half of Americans say that they will receive a COVID-19 vaccine once it becomes available for them to receive it. Driving this lack of enthusiasm, 60% of people surveyed don’t believe... Read More

WASHINGTON — Attitudes toward American colleges and universities may have started evolving before the pandemic set in, but COVID-19 truly upended the higher ed system in ways that are sure to have an impact for years to come. Through a series of mid-pandemic public opinion research... Read More

WASHINGTON - New polling data conducted by Hart Research on behalf of Protect Our Care, a health care advocacy organization, shows that Americans across party lines support healt hcare reforms as the top priority for the Biden administration. The same poll also shows that voters support... Read More

WEST LONG BRANCH, N.J. — Polling data from Monmouth University found that 56% of Americans approve of the House of Representatives impeaching former President Donald Trump for his role in inciting a violent mob to storm the United States Capitol. Public support for Trump’s second impeachment... Read More

WASHINGTON — Americans were more likely to designate the lack of government leadership and unity as the nation’s primary issue this month, according to polling analysis from Gallup. Tensions stoked by a contentious presidential transition, the impeachment of former President Donald Trump in the House of... Read More

WASHINGTON — A majority of Americans surveyed by Gallup predict the incoming Biden-Harris administration will make improvements to the environment and education while likely raising taxes and the national deficit. Gallup published its findings as part of an ongoing series of “public opinion surveys designed to... Read More