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Morning Consult | Bloomberg News: Trust in Biden vs. Trump and Ballot Performance in Seven U.S. Swing States
Decision intelligence company Morning Consult, on behalf of Bloomberg News, conducted a seven-state study in the 2024 political swing states (Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin) to uncover where voters stand on key issues surrounding the presidential election.
The findings below reflect data at the state level. Aggregated results from voters across the seven states can be found here.
Key Takeaways
In a head-to-head matchup with generic third-party candidates listed, former President Donald Trump is leading President Joe Biden in all seven 2024 swing states: Arizona (+5 percentage points), Georgia (+4 percentage points), Michigan (+2 percentage points), Nevada (+3 percentage points), North Carolina (+5 percentage points), Pennsylvania (+1 percentage point) and Wisconsin (+5 percentage points). However, all results were within each state’s margin of error.
When third-party candidates are removed from the ballot, Michigan resulted in a dead heat, with 44% support for Trump and Biden each, while Nevada moved in favor of Biden (+3 percentage points), suggesting that third-party candidates could play a pivotal role in the 2024 election. The remaining five states continued to lean in favor of Trump.
In each of the seven states, among the 16 listed issues, voters identified the economy as the single most important issue when deciding who to back in 2024. In each of the seven states, roughly 3 in 4 voters feel the U.S. economy is on the wrong track, and voters trust Trump more than Biden to handle the economy.
While roughly 4 in 10 voters in each state feel the economy is the single most important issue in deciding who to back, roughly 1 in 10 said the same about democracy. About 7 in 10 voters in each state trust that the results of the 2024 presidential election will be legitimate, suggesting that most voters are not concerned about election integrity in the upcoming election. Still, Biden came ahead of Trump in trust to handle democracy in 6 out of the 7 states, with Georgia being the exception.
To see what voters in each swing state are prioritizing on the 2024 ballot and their trust in Biden vs. Trump to handle each issue, download the data files below.
Data Downloads
To look at the full list of questions and responses by voters in each swing state, download the data files above.
Methodology
This survey, which identifies key issues in the 2024 election and measures how much swing state voters trust Biden vs. Trump on these issues and how Biden vs. Trump perform on swing state ballots, was conducted from Oct. 5-10, 2023, among a sample of 5,023 registered voters across seven 2024 political swing states: 804 registered voters in Arizona, 801 in Georgia, 706 in Michigan, 503 in Nevada, 702 in North Carolina, 807 in Pennsylvania and 700 in Wisconsin. The interviews were conducted online, and the data for each state was weighted to approximate a target sample of registered voters in the respective state based on gender, age, race, marital status, home ownership, and 2020 presidential vote. The margin of error for the full survey is +/-3 percentage points in Arizona, Georgia and Pennsylvania, and +/-4 percentage points in Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina and Wisconsin.
Interested in connecting with a member of the Morning Consult team regarding our recent data and analysis? Email [email protected].
