California voters are straying farther from the Democratic elites in the state and are becoming less interested in “resisting” the Trump administration, according to a Politico and UC Berkeley Citrin Center poll released Tuesday.
The poll sampled registered voters and “policy influencers” throughout the Golden State and found the two groups have steep differences on issues such as immigration, vehicle emissions, artificial intelligence, and pushback on the White House. While Democratic state lawmakers are determined to fight against President Donald Trump through policy, voters are feeling disheartened by their leaders, and what Politico dubbed, ‘Trump-resistance fatigue.’
The poll’s co-director, UC Berkeley political science professor Jack Citrin, said the results show how much California’s electorate has changed.
“The influentials are a much more homogenous group than the registered voter public,” Citrin told Politico. “The major difference is the electorate has polarized.”
Of the Democratic voters surveyed, 47% want stronger opposition towards Trump. On the other hand, Republicans and Independents make up a large portion of the 43% of voters that find their leaders “too confrontational.”
Of the policy influencers surveyed, nearly half said they thought California’s leaders were too passive while 43% of registered voters said they had very little to no confidence that state leaders could tackle pressing issues.
Voters are also less invested in the priorities of the state’s Democratic leadership.
The poll shows that while 60% — a sizable majority — of voters supported California’s “sanctuary” policies, 80% of policy influencers supported them; policy professionals were more likely than the surveyed voters to support migration and multiculturalism.
Forty-five percent of voters encouraged California’s vehicle emissions waivers — which require all new passenger cars sold to be zero emission by 2035 — as a means to oppose Trump and his agenda, but 40% did not back the emissions policy. In stark contrast, policy influencers supported California’s emissions policy 82% to 14%.
Artificial intelligence (AI) remains an issue that largely unites California voters. Half of voters surveyed believed AI is harming traditional jobs and 58% of policy influencers agreed. Thirty-four percent of voters and about 25% of policy influencers found it likely that AI will “displace” workers, Politico reported.
Citrin told the publication that those who work in policy are likely to have more education on AI as well as more job security in comparison to the general public, adding, “I don’t think that any influencer is going to lose their job because of AI.”
California’s skyrocketing cost of housing and growing homeless rate is also a centerpiece of voters’ concerns. Survey participants overwhelmingly marked both issues as priorities out of a list including infrastructure, education, the budget, immigration and public safety.
The poll used Verasight to pull 1,025 California registered voters, and 718 policy influencers were also surveyed. It was conducted on the TrueDot.ai platform from April 1 to 14, and the modeled error estimate for the voter survey is plus or minus five percentage points.
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