Almost 4 in 5 voters concerned about misinformation influencing midterms: poll

Nearly 4 out of every 5 registered voters in the U.S. are concerned about misinformation influencing this November’s midterm elections, according to a new poll commissioned by the Bipartisan Policy Center.

Forty-one percent of voters in the survey, which was conducted by Morning Consult, said they were “very concerned” about “misinformation influencing the 2022 midterm elections.” Another 37 percent said they were “somewhat concerned,” and only 17 percent were “not too concerned” or “not at all concerned.”

The concerns come after several election cycles that saw concerted efforts from both within the U.S. and abroad to mislead voters.

Russia and others infamously tried to influence the 2016 presidential race in Donald Trump’s favor over Hillary Clinton, an effort Trump has sown doubt over. Such meddling was attempted again in 2020.

On top of that, unsubstantiated claims of widespread voter fraud have proliferated since the 2020 race since Trump asserted without evidence that such misconduct robbed him of a win two years ago.

Republicans in state governments across the country are pushing legislation to restrict access to the ballot, and candidates aligned with Trump are still claiming that widespread fraud marred the 2020 race.

Several recounts and audits have confirmed that Trump lost several key states and the overall race in 2020, but the fraud claims have appeared to shake at least some voters’ confidence in the way elections are run.

Sixty-nine percent of voters in the new poll said they were “very” or “somewhat” confident that their vote will be counted accurately during the midterm elections, but 22 percent, or more than 1 in 5, said they were “not too confident” or “not at all confident.”

The Bipartisan Policy Center poll surveyed 2,004 registered voters from April 15-17 and has a margin of error of 2 percentage points.