Most Americans aren't as enthusiastic about U.S. territorial expansion as Donald Trump has been. A new survey finds that only 4% of Americans think the U.S. should seek to expand its territory if doing so requires using force. Far more — 33% — favor U.S. expansion, but not by force. And about half of Americans (48%) oppose the U.S. seeking to expand its territory. American support for expansion into specific territories — the Panama Canal, Greenland, Canada, and Gaza — is also low, though many Republicans are in favor, generally so long as force isn't required.
Support for the U.S. seeking to expand its territory, even if it means using force, is very low among Democrats (3% support), Republicans (6%), and Independents (2%). However, Republicans (51%) are twice as likely as Democrats (23%) and Independents (24%) to support the U.S. acquiring new territory without force.
Fewer than half of Americans support the U.S. expanding its territory — either by force or not — by taking control of each of the following locations suggested by Donald Trump: the Panama Canal (42% support), Greenland (33%), Canada (26%), or Gaza (24%). Very few Americans support using military force to acquire any of those four places, though one-quarter (25%) of Republicans do think the U.S. should use military force to acquire the Panama Canal. Republicans are more likely to support the U.S. acquiring the Panama Canal and Greenland than they are Canada or Gaza. Majorities of Democrats oppose expansion into each of the four territories, with or without force.
In Donald Trump's inauguration speech, he invoked the concept of manifest destiny as justification for expansion into Mars. Manifest Destiny is defined by some as the belief that U.S. territorial expansion is both justified and inevitable. Americans' views on manifest destiny are divided: 21% view the concept very or somewhat positively, 25% view it very or somewhat negatively, 28% view it neither positively nor negatively, and 26% are not sure. More Democrats (35%) than Republicans (14%) have a negative opinion of manifest destiny.
Our survey also measured views on other related concepts, including colonization (which 12% view positively and 41% view negatively) and decolonization (29% positive, 14% negative). In addition, we asked about multiculturalism — which nearly half of Americans (48%) view positively and only 15% see as a negative. Compared to multiculturalism, the concept of assimilation is less likely to be viewed as positive (31%) — though unlike multiculturalism, which is favored far more by Democrats than Republicans, views on assimilation are similar among members of both parties.
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— Carl Bialik contributed to this article
See the results for this YouGov poll
Methodology: This article includes results from an online survey conducted February 4 - 6, 2025 among 1,142 U.S. adult citizens. Respondents were selected from YouGov’s opt-in panel to be representative of adult U.S. citizens. The sample was weighted according to gender, age, race, education, 2024 presidential vote, 2020 election turnout and presidential vote, baseline party identification, and current voter registration status. 2024 presidential vote, at time of weighting, was estimated to be 48% Harris and 50% Trump. Demographic weighting targets come from the 2019 American Community Survey. Baseline party identification is the respondent’s most recent answer given around November 8, 2024, and is weighted to the estimated distribution at that time (31% Democratic, 32% Republican). The margin of error for the overall sample is approximately 4%.
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