Poll: 63% of Republicans Say Election Was Not 'Free and Fair'

The majority of Republicans do not believe the 2020 presidential election was free or fair, a Morning Consult survey released Tuesday showed.

Sixty-three percent of Republicans said the election was not “free and fair.” Of those, 40 percent said it was “definitely” not free or fair. Less than one-third of Republicans, or 31 percent, said the election was free and fair, and the vast majority of Democrats, 92 percent, agreed.

Republican trust in the election system has decreased exponentially in the days following the poll, falling to 37 percent. Sixty percent of Republicans distrust the election system, while 80 percent of Democrats trust it.

The survey asked respondents what President Trump should do, given the media’s declaration of Joe Biden winning the election. Only 18 percent of Republicans said Trump should “concede right away” compared to 72 percent of Democrats who said the same.

Less than a majority, or 47 percent of all registered voters surveyed, also hold that view. However, 46 percent of Republicans said the president should concede “eventually if he is unable to back up claims of widespread fraud.” Over one-quarter of Republicans said Trump “should not concede no matter what”:

Over three-quarters of Republicans indicated they hold that belief, that the election was not free or fair, due to mail-in voting, which they say “led to widespread voter fraud.” Seventy-three percent said “ballots were being tampered with,” followed by 62 percent of Republicans attributed the issue to poll watchers being barred from monitoring voting locations for fraud.

A slight majority, or 52 percent, of Republicans also attributed their view to “systems that store voting information” being “hacked or tampered with to alter counts.”

Overall, 52 percent of Republicans believe it is either very or somewhat unlikely the election will be overturned, while 35 percent believe it is somewhat or very likely that it will be overturned. Thirteen percent remain unsure.

The survey, taken November 20-23 among 1,996 registered voters, has a margin of error of +/- 2 percent.

The survey coincides with a CNBC/Change Research poll, which showed that only three percent of Trump voters view Biden as a legitimate winner of the election.

Politico’s recent 2020 Voter Priorities Survey also showed that 79 percent of Trump voters believe the election was stolen.