Poll: 3-in-4 Americans Oppose Allowing Convicted Felons to Vote from Prison

About 3-in-4 American voters oppose a plan by socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and other elected Democrats to allow convicted felons in local, state, and federal prisons to vote in federal elections from their jail cells, a new poll finds.

The latest Business Insider/SurveyMonkey poll finds that about 75 percent of Americans, or three-in-four, oppose a plan by Democrats to allow all convicted felons, including those currently serving time in prison, to vote in federal elections.

Only about 15 percent of Americans, or about three-in-20, said they supported giving voting rights to convicted felons that would allow them to vote from their prison cells. Likewise, only about 20 percent of Americans said they would support allowing non-violent felons to vote from prison.

Sanders and other elected Democrats like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez first voiced their support for allowing all 1.2 to 1.6 million convicted felons serving time in the prison system to vote from their jail cells last week. The plan would mean that up to 164,000 convicted rapists and 183,000 convicted murderers would be allowed to vote from prison in presidential and congressional elections.

“If you are a citizen, you have the right to vote. And that is a right we must protect because we know the history of this country, we know that women didn’t have the right to vote,” Sanders told supporters last week during a rally in Houston, Texas. “We know that African-Americans didn’t have the right to vote.”

Ocasio-Cortez wrote online that rather than focusing on the fact that convicted terrorists would be allowed to vote under Sanders’ plan, voters should center their attention on allowing “nonviolent” felons to vote from prison.

“To avoid looking completely + utterly out of touch w/ the reality our prison system: Instead of asking, ‘Should the Boston Bomber have the right to vote?’ Try, ‘Should a nonviolent person stopped w/ a dime bag LOSE the right to vote?’ Bc that question reflects WAY more people,” Ocasio-Cortez said.

Initially, Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) said she would entertain allowing convicted terrorists the right to vote from prison and death row, saying, “I think we should have that conversation” during a townhall.

After the town hall, though, Harris backtracked on her support, declaring that she actually opposes giving felons in prison the right to vote.

Under Sanders’ plan, convicted felons like mass murderer Dylann Roof, Boston bomber terrorist Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, serial killer and rapist Gary Ridgway, and serial child molester Larry Nassar would be eligible to vote from their prison cells.

Restoring voting rights for felons in prison has widespread support among the criminal justice reform lobby, as well as from efforts like those passed in Florida last year that is set to allow about 1.4 million ex-felons to vote in the 2020 presidential election.

John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter at @JxhnBinder.