Will The Presidential Election Happen? Poll Shows Americans Have Doubts Because Of Coronavirus

Two-thirds of Americans fear the coronavirus pandemic will disrupt the November election, with Democrats more likely than Republicans to expect voting will be disrupted, a Pew Research Center poll indicated Tuesday. The poll also indicated Democrats were more likely than Republicans to support voting by mail.

The poll followed comments by presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden that he feared President Trump would try to postpone the Nov. 3 general election.

The Pew poll queried 4,917 adults April 7-12.

The poll indicated 67% of Americans – 80% of Democrats and half of Republicans – agreed the pandemic will disrupt the ability to vote.

“While most Americans expect the coronavirus to affect the presidential election, majorities are at least somewhat confident that it will be conducted fairly and accurately [59%] and that all citizens who want to will be able to vote [63%],” Pew said, with Republicans more confident than Democrats.

Pew added: “Those who think the coronavirus outbreak is likely to significantly disrupt voting in November are less likely to express confidence the election will be conducted fairly and accurately or that all citizens who want to vote will be able to do so. To some extent, this reflects partisan patterns of opinions on these questions – but the pattern holds within both partisan groups as well.”

Seventy percent said any voter should be allowed to vote by mail, and more than half (52%) said all elections should be conducted that way. The percentage supporting mail-in voting is up 18 points since 2018. Currently, five states -- Colorado, Hawaii, Oregon, Washington and Utah – conduct all their elections by mail.

An overwhelming percentage of Democrats (87%) said they favored mail-in voting for anyone who wants to while 49% of Republicans support the concept. Republicans (68%) in states where vote-by-mail is more common actually favor expanding the process.

More than two-thirds of those queried (69%) support automatic voter registration. More than half (57%) said they opposed removing people from voter rolls if they haven’t cast ballots recently or confirmed their registration.