August 11, 2023 11:44 AM UTC

If You're Defending Trump, You're in the Minority in America

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• by: Colorado Pols

Many high-profile Republicans have publicly defended former President Donald Trump following his third — and perhaps most important — indictment related to his attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 Presidential election. Folks such as Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-ifle) and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy have made ridiculous arguments, alleging that Trump didn’t do anything wrong in trying to initiate a coup and/or that the Department of Justice is trying to distract from Hunter Biden’s laptop, or something.

These Republican leaders have continued to defend Trump despite most of them knowing full well that Trump’s legal strategy to avoid prison will be a massive problem for ALL Republicans in 2024. Whether the goal is to appeal to the MAGA base and try avoid the online wrath of Trump, or just to yell “Squirrel!” and hope Americans focus their attention elsewhere (which also isn’t working, according to the polling data), Republicans defending Trump’s behavior are finding that they are on the opposite side of the majority of Americans.

As Navigator Research reports today:

Three in five Americans continue to believe Donald Trump has committed a crime and support his indictment on charges related to overturning the 2020 election by a 20-point margin…

…60 percent of Americans believe Donald Trump has committed a crime, including 43 percent who believe he has “definitely committed a crime.” This belief is shared among nine in ten Democrats (89 percent), three in five independents (61 percent), and nearly three in ten Republicans (28 percent), including 40 percent of non-MAGA Republicans (Republicans who do not identify with the MAGA movement).

Perhaps most concerning for Trump defenders is that “Independent” voters overwhelmingly believe that Trump “has committed a crime”:

It’s also interesting to note that one of the most commonly-repeated narratives by Trump defenders — that Trump’s indictment shows that any American could be the subject of prosecution — is understood by Americans in exactly the opposite manner:

Two in three Americans agree with the statement that “if any average American did anything close to what Donald Trump has done, they would be indicted.”

“If Trump can be indicted, then anyone can be indicted” is not a bad thing — it’s one of the foundational points of a fair and equal system of justice.

We already know that defending Trump in Colorado is not conducive to electoral success outside of a handful of beet-red districts; Colorado voters rejected Trump by wide margins in both 2016 and 2020.

Nationally, polling data has indicated that Trump’s indictments have actually increased his support among Republican voters. That’s great news for Trump’s chances at winning the 2024 Republican Presidential nomination, but as we see again in this Navigator Research data, it’s a troublesome sign for GOP hopes at winning back the White House once everyone else gets to cast a ballot.