Nearly 40 percent of Americans say Trump or Biden second term ‘worst thing that could happen’

A plurality of American voters think that a second presidential term for either President Biden or former President Trump would be “the worst thing that could happen.” 

A Yahoo News-YouGov poll found that 37 percent of registered voters in both parties said reelection for Trump would be “the worst thing” for the country, and 35 percent thought the same if Biden ran again 2024.

Given the scale of five other options — unsure, “best thing that could happen,” “mostly good,” “a mix of good and bad,” “mostly bad” — to call the potential second-term wins, most respondents chose the pessimistic extreme.

Eighty-five percent of Democrats and 25 percent of Republicans are against a Trump bid in 2024, compared to 43 percent of Democrats and 84 percent of Republicans who are against Biden.

About three-quarters of Democrats felt a Trump reelection would be “the worst thing,” while about three-quarters of Republicans felt a Biden reelection would be the same. 

If the 2024 election was held today in a repeat match-up of 2020, 41 percent of voters report they’d back Biden, and 39 percent say they’d back Trump.

In a hypothetical where Biden stepped aside, just 30 percent of Democrats or independents who lean Democratic reported they’d want Vice President Harris to step up, while 52 percent of voters said they’d want someone else to be the Democratic nominee instead.

About a third of Republicans and independents who lean Republican said they’d rather see Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis as the Republican nominee, while 44 percent supported Trump.

Conducted July 28-Aug. 1, the poll surveyed 1,557 U.S. adults weighted for gender, age, race, education and 2020 presidential vote. The margin of error is 2.7 points.