A new poll commissioned by the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics indicates a sizable proportion of Americans support the concept of secession from the Union, with a majority of 2020 Trump voters favoring the idea and a strong plurality of Biden 2020 voters agreeing.
52% of Trump voters “somewhat agreed” with the statement “the situation in America is such that I would favor red states seceding from the Union to form their own country.” 41% of Biden voters somewhat agreed, as well, when the question was asked about blue states. 25% and 18% of Trump and Biden voters “strongly agreed” with the proposal respectively.
If the poll is to be believed, support for secession ideas has significantly increased since President Joe Biden’s ascension to the presidential throne, with previous polling suggesting 29% of Americans supported dividing the Union into regional countries– a proposition slightly different than outright secession. The same polling had suggested southern Republicans and Democrats from the Pacific Northwest were among the demographics most supportive of secession from the Union.
46% of Americans have previously expressed their view that the United States is destined for another Civil War, according to a February Zogby poll.
It’s likely that attempts at secession would create new problems for both parties without delivering immediate solutions in the event it became a reality, and some political commentators on the right have questioned willingness to embrace the idea by some of their partisans during Biden’s reign on the presidential throne. If anything, the considerable bipartisan support for a secession proposal indicates Biden has failed to deliver on “uniting the country,” a frequent campaign promise made by the 78-year old Democrat.
Most allusions to support of secession in American culture have invoked Civil War reenactors and stringent conservatives, whereas the polling indicates almost as many partisan liberals support the idea, as well. It seems likely that poll’s conservative majority in support of secession and the liberal plurality would be reversed in the event Donald Trump or another Republican was still President.
In more conventional political terms, the UVA poll revealed that Trump and Biden voters agree on several reasonable policy propositions, such as raising taxes on the ultra-wealthy, improving infrastructure, and creating a national family paid leave program.
Both Trump and Biden voters support the proposition of censoring media outlets associated with their political opposition, in a troubling development for the First Amendment.
“The divide between Trump and Biden voters is deep, wide, and dangerous. The scope is unprecedented, and it will not be easily fixed,” said UVA Center for Politics Director Larry J. Sabato of the poll. The UVA poll questioned 1,001 Trump voters and 1,011 Biden voters from July to August, asking a range of political and social questions.