Former president Donald Trump is facing numerous charges in both state and federal courts. The leader in polling for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination has been indicted on felony charges for working to overturn the result of the 2020 election and obstruct the certification of the electoral vote. Trump is also being indicted in Georgia over his efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss in the state. He also has been indicted on 40 charges related to the unauthorized possession of classified documents and obstructing government efforts to retrieve them. Lastly, he faces 34 charges related to a hush-money case, including for falsifying business records to reimburse his lawyer for payments made to an adult-film actress.
A January YouGov survey asked Americans about their thoughts on the pending cases, including whether they think Trump should and will be convicted in each case and what the timing of these trials should be as it relates to the election. For each of the four cases, Americans are more likely to think Trump should be convicted than to think he will be.
Each case was described to respondents in each question about it, as follows:
How familiar are Americans with the charges against Donald Trump? Among U.S. adult citizens, nearly all have heard at least a little about each of the cases. A majority (59%) of Americans have heard a lot about the case involving the 2020 election and Jan. 6, 2021. 49% have heard a lot about the classified-documents case. 48% have heard a lot about the Georgia election case. And 39% have heard a lot about the hush-money case.
Democrats and Republicans generally are about equally likely to have heard a lot about each case. That represents an increase in Republican awareness of the cases since December, when a survey found that more Democrats generally had heard a lot about each case. An August survey also found more awareness among Democrats for the charges that had been filed by then.
When Americans who had heard of each case were asked to rank the cases in order of importance, 50% said the most important case is the federal-election and Jan. 6 case. One-quarter (23%) said the classified-documents case is the most important, while fewer said the Georgia election case (15%) or the hush-money case (13%) were the most important.
Americans have varying views on whether the investigations in the cases against Trump are being conducted fairly or unfairly. For each of the investigations, more than 70% of Democrats believe it is being conducted fairly; few Republicans agree.
Among Americans, 44% — including 73% of Democrats and 16% of Republicans — think the Georgia election case is being conducted fairly. Similar percentages believe the investigation into the hush-money case is being done fairly: 42% of U.S. adult citizens, 72% of Democrats, and 12% of Republicans say this.
What about the federal-election case? Among U.S. adult citizens, 46% say the investigation is being done fairly while 36% say it is being done unfairly. Democrats (76%) are more likely than Independents (43%) or Republicans (16%) to believe the investigation into these events is being conducted fairly.
There has been little change in opinion about the fairness of cases against Trump since December.
Majorities of Americans believe each of the four cases against Trump is at least somewhat serious. On the federal-election and Jan. 6 charges, 44% of Americans say this case is very serious and 19% say it is somewhat serious. About half (41%) say the Georgia election case's charges are very serious; 20% say they are somewhat serious.
Democrats are more likely than Independents and Republicans to say each case is serious. Among Democrats, 70% say the federal-election and Jan. 6 case is very serious; 40% of Independents and 20% of Republicans agree. On the Georgia election case, 67% of Democrats believe it’s very serious while fewer Independents (37%) and Republicans (18%) share this view.
The shares of Americans who view each of the four cases as very serious has declined or stayed flat since December.
For each of the four cases against Trump, Americans are more likely to say that he should be convicted than to say that he will be. In the federal-election and Jan. 6 case, 45% think he should be convicted but just 30% think he will be. 44% think he should be convicted in the classified-documents case, while 30% think he will be. 43% of Americans say he should be convicted of a crime in the Georgia election case; 30% think he will be convicted. In the hush-money case, 39% think he should be convicted and 27% think he will be convicted.
70% of Democrats think Trump should be convicted of a crime in the hush-money case; even more think he should be convicted in each of the other three cases. For each of the four cases, fewer than 20% of Republicans think Trump should be convicted.
For each case, Democrats are far more likely than Independents and Republicans to think Trump will be convicted. 55% of Democrats think he will be convicted in the Georgia case; 20% of Independents and 14% of Republicans agree.
More than half of Democrats think Trump will be convicted in the federal-election and Jan. 6 case (54%), and 49% think so in the classified-documents case. Among Republicans, 13% think he will be convicted for the federal-election case and 16% believe he’ll be convicted for the classified-documents case.
And if Trump is convicted in any of these cases, will it affect his future political career? Many Americans believe it will have some effect.
42% say it would have a somewhat or very negative effect on his political career if he were to be convicted of the federal-election and Jan. 6 charges while 19% believe it would have a positive effect. The same percentages say it would have a negative (42%) or positive (19%) effect on his political future if he were convicted of the charges in the Georgia election case.
The timing of the trials may play a major role in Trump’s political future. 41% of Americans say the federal-election and Jan. 6 trial should begin before the 2024 election, 22% say it should begin after the election, and 21% say it should happen whenever the judge decides it should, regardless of the timing of the election. (The trial was set to begin on March 4, 2024 but is no longer.)
Similar shares say the trial in the Georgia election case should start before the 2024 election (40%), 22% think it should begin after the election, and 21% say it should be up to the judge. There is no date set for this trial.
The hush-money trial is set to begin in late March. The classified-documents trial is set to begin May 20, 2024.
Republicans are particularly likely to say the trials should start after the election. Among Republicans, 44% say the Georgia federal-election should start post-2024 election and 43% say the federal-election and Jan. 6 case should also begin after the election. 41% say the same about the hush-money case and the same share about the classified-documents case.
Democrats don’t agree. Majorities want the Georgia election case (61%), the federal-election and Jan. 6 case (60%), the classified-documents case (56%), and the hush-money case (52%) to happen before the 2024 election.
— Taylor Orth and Carl Bialik contributed to this article
Related:
- How Americans evaluate the charges filed against Donald Trump in three cases
- Most Americans expect Donald Trump to be the GOP nominee for president
- How Americans feel about Trump’s proposed policies and the Republican primary candidates
- Most Americans say voters should be able to decide Trump's eligibility
See the results for this YouGov poll
Methodology: The YouGov poll was conducted online on January 25 - 29, 2024 among 1,000 U.S. adult citizens. Respondents were selected from YouGov’s opt-in panel using sample matching. A random sample (stratified by gender, age, race, education, geographic region, and voter registration) was selected from the 2019 American Community Survey. The sample was weighted according to gender, age, race, education, 2020 election turnout and presidential vote, baseline party identification, and current voter registration status. Demographic weighting targets come from the 2019 American Community Survey. Baseline party identification is the respondent’s most recent answer given prior to November 1, 2022, and is weighted to the estimated distribution at that time (33% Democratic, 31% Republican). The margin of error for the overall sample is approximately 4%.
Image: Getty (Seth Wenig - Pool)
