This data was additionally published in “Yahoo News/YouGov poll shows two-thirds of voters want the Senate to call new impeachment witnesses” as part of a Yahoo News/YouGov poll on impeachment
Last week, the Republican-led US Senate declined to call witnesses that could shed light on the events that led to President Donald Trump’s impeachment, even as a majority of Americans (58%) wanted to hear from more witnesses.
This week, the Senate may be forced to reconsider. Over the weekend, former national security adviser John Bolton revealed that Trump told him in August 2019 that he wanted to freeze security aid to Ukraine until the country's officials announced investigations into former Vice President Joe Biden. The president has denied the claim, but key Republicans have said it’s “increasingly likely” that the majority party would call Bolton to testify.
According to a Yahoo News/YouGov poll conducted prior to the Bolton revelation, a majority of registered voters (53%) want to hear from the former adviser.
A plurality of registered voters want to hear from all of the witnesses mentioned. In the Yahoo News/YouGov poll conducted January 21 - 22, the only prospective witnesses that registered voters wanted to hear from more than Bolton were the president’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani (60%), and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo (57%).
About half of registered voters want to hear from former Vice President Joe Biden (52%) or his son, Hunter Biden (50%). Biden said on January 22 that he would not engage in a witness swap in order to get Bolton to testify, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said that suggestion was “off the table.”
A plurality of Americans want to hear from White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney (50%) and Lev Parnas (47%). Parnas is an associate of Giuliani who recently released a recording of Trump talking about former US ambassador to Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch. In the recording, Trump is heard saying, “Get her out tomorrow. I don't care. Get her out tomorrow. Take her out. OK? Do it.” Trump has denied knowing Parnas.
The same poll shows that a majority of registered voters (58%) believe Trump asked a foreign leader to investigate his political opponent. A majority (58%) believe he ordered White House and other Executive Branch officials to withhold information and not testify before Congressional committees investigating him. About half of registered voters (51%) believe Trump abused his powers as President of the United States. Nearly half (49%) believe he withheld military aid to Ukraine until they agreed to conduct the investigations he wanted.
Americans remain split on whether Trump should be removed from the White House: 42 percent say he should be and 41 percent say he should not be. Among registered voters, 46 percent say he should be removed and 45 percent say he should remain in office.
See the full toplines and crosstab results from the Yahoo News/YouGov poll
Related: Americans believe Trump is less effective than Obama on Iran
Methodology: The survey was conducted by YouGov for Yahoo News. A representative sample of 1,500 U.S adults from YouGov’s research panel were interviewed online. The sample was weighted by age, race, gender, education, voter registration, and 2016 presidential vote. The margin of error for the full sample was 2.8 percent.
Image: Getty
