A plurality of U.S. voters appear to reject employer vaccine mandates, a Convention of States Action/Trafalgar Group survey released Tuesday found.
The survey asked respondents to describe their opinion of companies that are not requiring employees to be vaccinated for the Chinese coronavirus.
Overall, a plurality, 42.7 percent, said they are “more likely” to do business with those companies. Of those, 32.7 percent said they are “much more likely” to do so. Just over one-third of respondents, 34.4 percent, say they are “less likely” to do business with such companies, and 23.1 percent expressed no opinion on the matter.
Opinions vary significantly on party lines. Democrats, for instance, are far more likely to say they are less likely to do business with companies that refuse to force employees to be vaccinated. According to the survey, 49 percent of Democrats said they are “less likely,” while 28.8 percent said they are “more likely.”
A majority of Republicans, 55.5 percent, said they are “more likely” to do businesses with businesses not requiring employees to be vaccinated, and a plurality of independents, 43.2 percent, agreed with that sentiment.
“In poll after poll, Americans of all political stripes choose the freedom-driven approach on COVID-19,” Mark Meckler, President of Convention of States Action, said in a statement.
“Despite this and the fact that most folks report in this survey that they are already vaccinated, Washington, DC continues to push for mandates,” he continued:
For Washington, there will be electoral consequences in 2022. For corporations and businesses, being on the side of mandates will directly impact their bottom line. On a larger scale, this irrational push for compliance at all costs will have a negative impact on an already pandemic-challenged economy.
The survey, taken August 14-16, among 1,080 respondents, has a margin of error of +/- 2.98 percent.
The survey comes as some states — including Oregon, New York, California, New Jersey, and Maine — begin to take sweeping action, forcing either healthcare workers, educators, and state workers to be vaccinated as a condition of employment, with limited exceptions.
This week, CVS Health Corp. announced it is mandating clinical and corporate workers to get the vaccine as well.
On Monday, following the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) approval of the Pfizer vaccine for those 16 and older, President Biden urged private businesses to “step up with vaccine requirements.”