Most Democrats say that President Trump is more to blame than China or the World Health Organization for the coronavirus crisis the United States is now experiencing, according to the latest Rasmussen Reports poll of likely U.S. voters released Monday.
The poll asked likely voters if they agreed with Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT)’s recent statement: “The reason that we’re in the crisis that we are today is not because of anything that China did, is not because of anything the [World Health Organization] did. It’s because of what [President Trump] did.”
Only 42 percent of all likely U.S. voters agreed with Murphy’s statement, but 47 percent disagreed. Eleven percent were undecided.
Broken down on party lines, 60 percent of Democrats agreed with Murphy that Trump was to blame more than China, while 71 percent of Republicans disagreed.
Unaffiliated voters also disagreed by a higher margin — at 46 percent to 39 percent.
Rasmussen Reports said in a post accompanying the poll:
The coronavirus outbreak originated in Wuhan, China, and most authorities agree that it was able to spread globally because the Chinese government delayed for several weeks notifying the international community. The WHO was slow in responding to the virus. The Chinese government has tried to blame the United States for the virus behind the scenes in overseas propaganda.
A Southampton University study in March found that if China had taken steps one week earlier to prevent the spread of coronavirus, it would reduced the number of cases worldwide by 66 percent.
It also said if China had acted two weeks earlier, it would have reduced the cases by 86 percent, and if it had acted three weeks earlier, cases would have been reduced by 95 percent.
Across the board, most voters are unhappy with the U.S. government’s response to the coronavirus — 42 percent say it is worse than other countries, while 32 percent say it has been better. Twenty-four percent view it as about the same.
Shutdowns across the nation have resulted in mass layoffs and some civil unrest.
Broken down by party, 62 percent of Democrats believe the U.S. government’s response has been worse than others, and 56 percent of Republican voters think the U.S. response has been better. Among unaffiliated likely voters, 24 percent say the response has been better, 42 percent say it has been worse, and 32 percent view it as about the same.
The poll surveyed 1,000 likely voters and was conducted between April 16 and 19, 2020 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95 percent level of confidence.
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