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Published 31 May 2024

Former President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee for President, was convicted yesterday in a Manhattan courtroom on 34 counts in a case related to the payment of hush money to adult film star Stormy Daniels during the 2016 Presidential election. While the legal process will likely continue through appeals, this decision marks a potentially pivotal moment in an election Stack’s polling has shown is extremely close. 

There has been and will continue to be a significant amount of noise about the potential effect of this conviction, ranging from those who think it will mark the effective end of Trump’s chances of winning back the White House to those, reportedly including his own campaign, who believe it could benefit the former President. Our analysis provides three key takeaways:

1. Polls suggest a conviction will hurt Trump overall, particularly with swing voters in key states

Stack conducted polling in April which looked at how support for Trump would be affected by a conviction in any of his legal cases. Unsurprisingly, our results showed that a conviction would help Trump with his base, including those who voted for him in 2020 and registered Republicans more broadly, while it would make Biden supporters and registered Democrats less likely to support him.

However, the data also identified two challenges for Trump post-conviction. First, a small but significant group of registered Republicans (10%) and 2020 Trump voters (9%) say a conviction would make them less likely to support him this time. This is larger than the proportion of Democrats or Biden voters who said they would move the other way if he were convicted. One of the major unknowns of this election is whether Trump can fully consolidate the Republican vote behind him, particularly disaffected supporters of Nikki Haley. Our data suggests a conviction makes this more difficult. But it is also interesting to note that WinRed, the Republican digital fundraising platform, crashed immediately after the verdict was announced - suggesting that some parts of his base have been highly activated by the trial and that the Trump campaign is likely to focus on this conviction to improve his diminished fundraising compared to Biden. 

The second problem for Trump is with swing voters. We look at this in two ways: using registered Independents as a proxy for this group reveals that 34% say they are less likely to support Trump following a conviction, compared to just 21% who say they are more likely to support him. This net negative score of -13% suggests a conviction will, on balance, hurt more than it helps among the voters who may decide the election.

2. Not all convictions are created equal and the public were already skeptical about the Stormy Daniels case

So we know that, on balance, a conviction is likely to hurt Trump more than it helps him. However, we also know that this case is viewed with more skepticism than the others by the electorate. Polling for the Associated Press in April showed that only 35% of voters believed Trump’s actions were illegal in the Stormy Daniels case, compared to more than 45% for the three other major cases. 

With this in mind, it seems reasonable to suggest that the effect of this conviction will be smaller than a “generic” conviction asked about in many public polls. The efforts of senior Republicans to raise questions on the legality of the case may further reduce the impact, particularly among Trump’s base. Perhaps most importantly, delays in Trump’s other legal cases mean this is likely to be the only case completed before election day. If Trump can brush off this conviction, his major electoral challenges will be behind him.

3. Will any impact on the polls last?

Taken together, our analysis suggests the conviction will hurt Trump in the polls particularly among swing voters. However, the election is still 5 months away with debates and party conventions still to come. The real question is not whether polls carried out in the next week show Trump doing worse - they almost certainly will - but whether polls in a month suggest there’s been a lasting impact. 

This is inevitably a difficult question to answer, but our view is that in a race pitting two candidates who are extremely well known to voters and both viewed in broadly negative terms the lasting effect is likely to be small. Even if the conviction does turn out to push the small group of Trump-skeptic Republicans away from the former President, a poor showing in the debate or a slip up by Biden could easily pull them back into the fold.

On the other hand, if the impact of Trump’s conviction on polls is limited it would actually improve his chances of winning. After all, his legal issues have been one of the main red flags around his campaign from the beginning. If he avoids significant electoral damage, he has a relatively clear (albeit narrow) path to victory.