Politics shaping views about virus

Trump, Biden supporters disagree over mask effectiveness, reopening schools, businesses

California voters are wary of sending children back to school in person, support rules requiring people to wear face masks in stores and offices, and think their state moved too quickly in trying to reopen its economy amid the coronavirus pandemic, a UC Berkeley poll released Wednesday found. But in a testament to how politicized the response to COVID-19 has become, the Institute of Governmental Studies poll found attitudes on each of those topics varied widely depending on one factor: Whether the person answering supports President Donald Trump.

There were mirrored divisions between Trump supporters and those backing former Vice President Joe Biden on whether California made a mistake when it sought to reopen shuttered sectors of its economy earlier this year, before backtracking on that plan amid a surge of new infections.

The poll found 80% of Biden voters thought the state moved too quickly to reopen businesses, while 79% of Trump supporters thought the opposite — that the restrictions needed to be lifted because of the damage inflicted on the economy. Overall, 61% of residents said the state was too hasty in its initial reopening.

Public health officials have watched this polarization with dread for much of the pandemic, as everything from mandated face coverings to in-person school

ing have turned into political battles, with many of Trump’s most ardent supporters digging into positions that are at odds with what epidemiologists say must be done to contain the deadly virus.

“It’s almost as if there’s a segment of the voting public that is off on an island looking at the world differently from the rest of the voting public,” said Mark DiCamillo, director of the IGS poll.

Partisanship is hardly a new phenomenon, of course. But in the coronavirus era, DiCamillo said, it has played a key role in determining whether people are willing to follow the advice of public health officials.

As a new school year begins — and after the Trump administration spent weeks pushing for schools to bring students back for in-person learning — nearly half of the president’s supporters in California, 47%, said they think schools should reopen for normal in-person instruction. Just 14% of respondents overall, and 1% of Biden supporters, hold that view.

Instead, 51% of Biden voters said the right strategy for education this fall is online-only instruction, while 44% said they want to see a hybrid model in which students learn inperson on certain days and online on others to ensure class sizes stay small. Only 12% of Trump supporters thought online learning was appropriate, while 36% backed the hybrid idea.

The poll was conducted in English and Spanish between July 21 and 27, with an online survey of more than 8,000 registered California voters. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 2%, according to IGS.

There was more widespread agreement on face coverings.

The poll found people across the political spectrum, including more than two-thirds of Trump supporters, agreed with the public health consensus that masks can be effective in limiting the spread of the coronavirus, and favored rules that require people to wear them in enclosed spaces.

But again, Trump supporters were far less likely than Biden voters to believe masks were “extremely” effective, or to support face covering requirements. Nearly onequarter of Trump supporters said they believe face coverings are “not effective at all,” and 32% opposed mask requirements. Practically no Biden supporters held those views.

“If people ask you if the sky is blue, it seems to be affected by if you’re a Republican or a Democrat these days,” DiCamillo said. “Here’s its coloring your view on what most people would believe to be a scientific fact — that face masks are effective.”