A week out from the presidential election, the two major party nominees remain historically unpopular. But that unpopularity and lack of respect may have begun to trickle down to the candidates’ supporters, according to a Pew Research Center analysis published Tuesday.
The survey reported about six-in-10 Clinton supporters would have a “hard time” respecting someone who cast their vote for Trump, although a narrow majority of Trump supporters said they would feel comfortable respecting a Clinton backer.
The analysis also indicated that support for Trump versus Clinton — and the respect one side might have for the other — was split sharply by demographics. Clinton supporters who were white, female, college-educated or younger were more likely to profess less respect for those voting for her opponent.
Black and Hispanic supporters for the former secretary of state were more evenly split on the respect question. About half of each demographic reported that they would have “no trouble” respecting Trump voters, compared to 34 percent of white voters.
Those divisions also seem unlikely to recede post-election: Nearly 90 percent of respondents said they expected political divisions to stay the same or increase if Clinton wins, while 81 percent said the same in the event of a Trump victory.
Respondents were only slightly more positive about the nation’s political unity in the senarios where their candidate won. Two-thirds of Clinton supporters predicted no change in political divisiveness should she win. Trump supporters were more likely than Clinton supporters to expect that the nation would be more politically split should their candidate win (33 percent to 25 percent) but nearly half said they expected no change either.