Federal Jan. 6 conviction would hurt Trump most against Biden: Poll

A conviction in former President Trump’s federal trial concerning efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election would hurt him more than being found guilty in his other cases, a new poll found.

The Harvard CAPS-Harris poll found Trump leading President Biden in a hypothetical general election match-up by 7 points. But Biden leads Trump by 4 points, 52 percent to 48 percent, if the former president is convicted of the charges he faces related to the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol insurrection.

Convictions in the other cases against Trump would tighten the race, but Trump still leads Biden among respondents. The poll found Trump would still lead Biden by 6 points if he is convicted in the case of his alleged mishandling of classified and sensitive documents, and he would lead by 2 points if convicted in the case over his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election in Georgia.

Trump is facing 91 charges across four criminal cases for various alleged wrongdoing. His first charge was in a case in Manhattan over hush-money payments made to porn actress Stormy Daniels for her to remain quiet about an affair they had.

Pollsters found 55 percent of respondents said Trump has committed crimes that he should be convicted of, including 84 percent of Democrats, 55 percent of independents and 25 percent of Republicans. Just above 50 percent said Trump would be a threat to democracy if he were reelected to another term.

Polls have generally shown a close race between Trump and Biden in a general election match-up. Despite polls showing a clear majority do not want either candidate to be their parties’ nominees, both seem likely to win their respective nominations. 

Trump leads Biden by 1 point in the national polling average from The Hill/Decision Desk HQ. 

The Harvard CAPS-Harris Poll survey was conducted Jan. 17-18 and surveyed 2,346 registered voters. It is a collaboration of the Center for American Political Studies at Harvard University and the Harris Poll.

The survey is an online sample drawn from the Harris Panel and weighted to reflect known demographics. As a representative online sample, it does not report a probability confidence interval.