New poll: 62% of California’s young Republicans want a primary challenge to Trump
Almost two-thirds of registered California Republicans under the age of 40 think it would be a “good thing” if someone challenged President Donald Trump in the Republican primary, according to a new poll from UC Berkeley’s Institute of Governmental Studies.
The Berkeley IGS Poll, conducted online in English and Spanish from Sept. 13 to 18, asked 4,527 registered California voters for their thoughts on Trump’s presidency. Roughly 67% of the state’s likely Republican, Democrat and independent voters said they were not inclined to vote for Trump in the general election and 69% said they disapproved of the job Trump is doing in office.
The poll also found that 72% of likely voters thought the country is on the “wrong track,” including 93% of Democrats, 33% of Republicans and 75% of voters who do not have a preference for either party.
Roughly 60% of California’s likely Republican voters said they thought it would be a “bad thing” for another Republican to challenge Trump in the primary.
“However, a significant minority of likely Republican primary voters, 40%, feel an intra-party challenger would be a good thing,” said Mark DiCamillo, head of the Berkeley IGS Poll. “Most likely to feel this way are Republican voters under 40, 62% of whom think it would be a good thing for other GOP candidates to square off against Trump in the primaries.”
Republicans who identified as “very conservative,” “evangelical Christian” or “age 65 or older” were the most likely to view a primary challenge to Trump as a “bad thing.”
The poll, the second Berkeley IGS Poll released this week, had an overall margin of error of 2 percentage points.