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No wonder he is known as Telfon Don.
Trump touted the latest DailyMail.com poll during a news conference Friday following his felony conviction, calling it proof that the American people are rallying to his side.
In fact, the poll, conducted Thursday night after the verdict was announced, found that positive views of the former president among the electorate as a whole increased by six percentage points.
He is now viewed more favorably by almost all voting blocs – except Democrats – than before the Manhattan jury’s decision.
However, public opinion about the former president remains divided: 49 percent have a positive perception and 48 percent a negative one.
This snapshot of voters also sheds new light on a trend the Mail has been following for the past year: that as the number of accusations and now convictions against Trump has increased, so has his public support.
We’ve dug into the details of our surveys, focus groups, and field research to determine why.
While former President Trump praised the DailyMail poll suggesting his conviction is not discouraging Americans, a polling expert reveals why this may not translate to the ballot box.
THE INDEPENDENTS GO TO TRUMP
Last August, he was speaking to a group of independent voters in Georgia when Fulton County officials released Trump’s booking photo.
The now infamous mug shot was taken after the former president turned himself in to authorities on charges of alleged attempts to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
Seeing the image, heads shook and frowned.
However, rather than expressing disapproval of Trump’s alleged criminality, the focus group’s view was that the state had gone too far. They perceived a political motivation behind the accusation.
Since that day, the Mail poll has seen Trump’s positive favorability rating among independents rise from four percentage points behind Biden to three points ahead of the incumbent president.
That’s not what many experts predicted among independent-minded voters who tend to be college-educated suburbanites averse to political drama.
This week’s new poll showed an additional four percentage point shift among these independents toward a more positive view of Trump.
Perhaps a guilty verdict in any of the other pending cases against the 45th president would have swayed these voters differently: election conspiracy and mishandling of classified documents are considered much more serious.
But it appears that independents largely do not believe that the hush money case was pursued for the right reasons or that Trump’s actions were troubling enough for charges to be filed in the case.
With that information in hand, it’s no surprise that the verdict led to 20 percent of independents saying they feel more positive about Trump, and only 16 percent more negative.
And there was more good news for the Republican candidate in this poll…
JL Partners surveyed 403 likely voters immediately following Thursday’s guilty verdict to assess its impact on the November election. Results suggest a raise for Trump
MAGA WORLD RALLYES
The impulse to support Trump was most pronounced, unsurprisingly, among his base.
In our survey, 36 percent of Trump 2020 voters said his felony conviction made them feel more positive about him.
Fifty-four percent said the jury’s decision had no impact on their feelings. And six percent said the guilty verdict made them feel more negative.
Voters 65 and older were unmoved by the verdict. Only 11 percent came away with a more negative opinion. Almost seven in 10 older people said their opinions, whether positive or negative, had not changed.
Those results would be consistent with the feedback I received while I was in snowy Iowa in January, as the state prepared for its first-in-the-nation caucuses.
I sat down with Rocky, a 69-year-old registered Republican, who told me that early in the Republican presidential race he was more interested in backing Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis as a possible candidate. But when Trump’s accusations began to subside in early 2023, Rocky said, his ultimate choice became clear.
Trump is a “fighter” fighting against a corrupt state, he said. In Rocky’s opinion, Trump deserved his support.
The overwhelmingly positive response to the verdict among party faithful indicates that Trump remains on track to retain and even build on the high level of enthusiasm among his supporters.
Republican voters who have never chosen Trump are another story…
Trump’s opponents celebrated the result outside the court
THE GOP OLD GUARD IS ANNOYING, BUT FOR HOW LONG?
The Mail poll suggests Trump still faces a challenge when it comes to mobilizing a significant group of Republicans.
One in 10 Republicans said they have a more negative view of Trump after the verdict. These people are largely in the moderate conservative camp.
These, who often endorsed Nikki Haley or Ron DeSantis in the primaries, are the remnants of the party’s old guard: They are typically older, wealthy, college-educated, and business-savvy.
In the succinct words of one of them, a retiree from North Carolina: “For Republicans like me, it’s all very embarrassing. It’s like finding out your sister is a prostitute.
But will these Republicans really carry this grievance into November?
Both Haley and DeSantis, despite their sometimes brutal clashes with Trump, have now officially endorsed him.
The prize of lower taxes – with Trump’s tax cuts set to expire in 2025 and more conservative appointments to the Supreme Court – might simply persuade these moderates to come on board.
Biden’s base is another story…
Following the conviction of his 2024 election rival, President Biden condemned Trump’s response, saying it is “irresponsible for anyone to say this was rigged just because they don’t like the verdict.”
DEMOCRATS OUTRAGED BUT IMPACTS
President Biden’s typical base voter hates Donald Trump.
When asked to describe their reaction to the verdict, this group’s number one emotional response was “happy” and the most common word to describe their reasoning was that Trump is a “criminal.”
But that’s how the vast majority of Democrats have felt for a long time. Last year, when the Mail asked Democrats to sum up their opinion of Trump in one word, they also said “criminal”.
Fifty-five percent said their negative opinion of Trump remained unchanged following this week’s verdict. Only two in 10 Democrats told us they now felt more negative toward him.
Core elements of the party’s base were also unaffected.
Two in 10 young voters — ages 18 to 29 — said their negative opinions of Trump had not changed. Nineteen percent felt more negative toward him.
Also worrying Democrats is that it appears Biden’s base is not only unenthused, but fractured.
Young voters are generally angry with Biden for his handling of the war in Gaza. Our March poll showed that the president’s favorability ratings had dropped 20 percentage points among women ages 18 to 29 since October 7.
Surprisingly, 35 percent of black voters in this week’s survey said their positive perception of Trump actually increased, while 19 percent became bitter toward him.
African Americans, so crucial to Biden’s reelection, are leaning toward voting for independent candidate RFK Jr., or not voting at all, in numbers that are very dangerous for Biden.
Biden is also projected to only retain 73 percent of his voter base in 2020, compared to Trump’s 86 percent.
If the president’s campaign thought the verdict would energize and unify his traditional voters, our poll suggests they should think again.
The reason for the apathy of Biden’s base is negative opinions about the president himself. To change that, Democrats will need to bolster their candidate rather than simply criticizing the widely known figure that is Donald Trump.
What our polls don’t answer is: what happens if Trump is sent to prison?
A seismic moment like this could further galvanize Trump’s base, or dishearten wavering independents and Never Trump Republicans once and for all.
