Half of adults think political violence is a ‘very big problem’: Poll

The attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump has the vast majority of adults believing that political violence is a problem, according to a new poll.

A YouGov poll released Sunday and conducted in the aftermath of the Saturday evening shooting in Butler, Pennsylvania, showed 50% said political violence is a “very big problem,” while 32% said it is “somewhat of a problem.”

The concerns about political violence are roughly the same along ideological lines, with 47% of Democrats, 46% of independents, and 57% of Republicans believing it is a “very big problem.”

The greatest variation comes with age, where older adults are more likely to see political violence as a “very big problem” than younger adults. Only 37% of those ages 18-29 said it is a “very big problem,” compared to 42% of those ages 30-44, 55% of those ages 45-64, and 63% of those ages 65 and older.

The last major presidential assassination attempt was 43 years ago, in 1981, when then-President Ronald Reagan was shot outside of the Washington Hilton and nearly died of his injuries. The most recent assassination of a major party presidential candidate was 56 years ago, when then-Sen. Robert F. Kennedy was killed in Los Angeles while running for the Democratic nomination for president in 1968.

Leaders in both the Democratic and Republican parties have denounced the shooting and called for the political temperature to be turned down. The 2024 presidential campaign has been one of the most hotly contested in recent history, similar to the 2016 and 2020 campaigns.

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The U.S. Secret Service’s job in protecting Trump and other former presidents and presidential candidates has come under intense scrutiny since the Saturday shooting, and the pollster also found there is some doubt among adults about the agency’s ability to do its job.

Only 20% said they are “very confident” in the Secret Service’s ability to protect presidential candidates in a survey conducted by YouGov on Sunday. A plurality of respondents, 45%, said they were somewhat confident, while 17% said they were not very confident and 7% said they were not at all confident in the Secret Service’s ability to protect candidates.