A majority of Americans are still sane enough to have misgivings about allowing a criminally indicted candidate to run for president of the United States.
A new Quinnipiac University poll found that 57% of Americans believe criminal charges should disqualify Donald Trump from running for president again, while 38% say they shouldn't.
The partisan divide is no surprise, with Democrats favoring disqualification 88%-9% while three-quarters of Republicans say criminal charges are fine (75%-23%). Independents favor disqualification by nearly 20 points, 55%-36%.
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Another notable data point from the poll: Nearly 7 in 10 Americans (69%) say Trump was mainly acting in his own interests when he posted on social media that he would be arrested in New York and urged mass protests to "take our nation back."
Still, nearly a quarter of Americans (24%) are deluded enough to believe Trump was acting out of concern for democracy.
In the GOP primary, however, Trump's imminent indictment along with his lies don't appear to be hurting him one bit. The Q poll puts him 10 points ahead of his chief rival, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, 52%-42%.
But include the other candidates and things look even sunnier for Trump:
- Trump: 47%
- DeSantis: 33%
- Haley: 4%
- Pence: 5%
No one else garners more than 2% support.
An interesting footnote to the GOP primary from the cross tabs: College graduates favor DeSantis over Trump by 17 points, 47%-30%, while those with no degree back Trump over DeSantis by 24 points, 51%-27%.
So an appetite exists among Republican college graduates for an alternative to Trump, and they have set their sights on DeSantis for now. But if DeSantis doesn't live up to the hype, it will be interesting to see where this cohort migrates to next.