I’m actually a little concerned the number isn’t higher.
A majority of the public would not vote for a socialist to be president of the United States, according to a new poll.
The poll, which was conducted by Gallup and published on Tuesday, found that 45% of respondents would support a socialist for president, a drop from 2015 when 47% said they would. Fifty-three percent of respondents said they would not vote for a socialist candidate.
While most independents were not supportive of a socialist president, a clear majority of Democrats, 76%, said they could back a socialist. Just 17% of Republicans, however, said the same.
The question was not directly tied to any specific candidate, though Sen. Bernie Sanders is the only Democrat running for president who self-identifies as a Democratic socialist. Sanders’s embrace of the socialist label has concerned some Democrats. During the party’s primary debate on Friday night, Amy Klobuchar and Joe Biden both said that picking a socialist as the nominee frightened them.