Poll: Young voters in 12 states, including Florida, think Donald Trump’s felonies disqualify him

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Under-30 voters in a dozen states — including Florida — are further souring on Donald Trump’s candidacy in the wake of damaging court verdicts against the former President, newly released polling figures show.

Seventy-four percent of voters 18-29 in Florida, Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia and Wisconsin think Trump, as a convicted felon, shouldn’t be allowed near the White House again.

That includes a majority of Democrats, Republicans and independents, according to Washington-based public research firm The Generation Lab, which surveyed 1,080 young voters in early June for Voters of Tomorrow, a Generation Z-led progressive election engagement organization.

The survey, which found 74% of Floridians agreed that a convicted felon should be barred from seeking the presidency, had a 3-percentage-point margin of error.

Notably, the survey was conducted before the first 2024 presidential debate, which left many concerned about President Joe Biden’s mental fitness for the job. National polling has since shifted more favorably toward Trump, with the former President expanding his lead to 6 percentage points in a New York Times/Siena College survey published Wednesday.

The Generation Lab’s poll, conducted June 2-7, found that 57% of respondents across 12 states viewed Trump more negatively after his conviction on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records to cover up his affair with an adult film actress before the 2016 election.

In Florida, the divide was even starker. Sixty-two percent of respondents said their opinion of Trump diminished “more” or “much more” afterward, compared to 29% who said the verdict didn’t change their opinion and 3% who viewed him even more positively.

Similarly, 53% of young voters across the 12 states said a jury’s finding that Trump was liable for sexual abuse and defamation — offenses for which he was ordered to pay more than $88 million in damages — was also a big minus.

Sixty-three percent of under-30 Floridians agreed with them. Just 5% of respondents across all 12 states and only 2% in Florida said they liked Trump more after the jury’s ruling.

An overwhelming share of young voters are also rejecting Trump’s repeated claims that the justice system was “rigged” against him. Just 16% of all respondents to the survey agreed with him, compared to 52% who said the verdict was fair.

In Florida alone, 22% of young voters said they believed the justice system worked unjustly against the former President. Fifty-four percent said it didn’t. The remainder said they didn’t know one way or the other.

As to be expected, Democrats shared harsher opinions of Trump. Responding to the above query, for instance, 82% of Democrats said they believed the convictions were not rigged, compared to 51% of independents and 37% of Republicans who said the same. Meanwhile, just 5% of Democrats said they thought Trump faced prosecutorial and judicial bias. Thirteen percent of independents and 15% of Republicans agreed.

The Generation Lab’s polling also indicates that the ground Biden lost in voter sentiment after last week’s debate can still be regained and added to. Asked whether Trump’s conviction of paying Daniels hush money would impact their likelihood of voting for Biden, 25% of young voters in all 12 states said they were more motivated to cast ballots for him.

That increase was most marked among Democrats (40% more likely), but significant shares of independents and Republicans — 23% and 11%, respectively — also expressed a greater willingness to vote for the incumbent.

Sunshine State-specific figures Florida Politics viewed that did not include a by-party breakdown showed 29% of respondents saying they were more likely to vote for Biden compared to 13% who said they were even more disinclined to support him.

The largest share, 58%, said the convictions did not affect their allegiances or didn’t know how they felt.