Republican loyalty to Trump and rioters climbs in 3 years after Jan. 6 Capitol attack
Three years after the Jan. 6 attack, Republicans are more sympathetic to those who stormed the U.S. Capitol and more likely to absolve Donald Trump of responsibility for the attack than they were in 2021, according to a Washington Post-University of Maryland poll.
Republicans’ increasing loyalty to the former president comes as he simultaneously campaigns for reelection and fights criminal charges over his attempt to stay in power after losing in 2020. Republicans are now less likely to believe Jan. 6 participants were “mostly violent,” less likely to believe Trump bears responsibility for the attack and are slightly less likely to view Joe Biden’s election as legitimate than they were in a December 2021 Post-UMD survey.
In follow-up interviews, some said their views have changed because they now believe the riot was instigated by law enforcement to suppress political dissent — a baseless contheory that has been promoted heavily in right-wing media and by Trump in his speeches and in his legal fight against the four-count federal indictment he faces in Washington, D.C.
“From a historical perspective, these results would be chilling to many analysts,” said Michael J. Hanmer, director of the Center for Democracy and Civic Engagement at the
University of Maryland.
But Republican views are more fractured than those of Democrats, who remain largely in agreement that the riot was a violent threat to democracy for which Trump bears responsibility. “In the current context of hyper-partisanship, there seem to be some divisions among Republicans,” Hanmer said. Independents, according to the poll, mostly side with Democrats.
As Trump leads the Republican field for president by a wide margin, the poll reveals several key takeaways.
VIEWS ON BIDEN’S VICTORY
Despite audits in multiple states and nationally televised congressional hearings in which state officials and aides to
Trump confirmed there was no evidence of fraud in the 2020 election, more Americans question Biden’s victory than they did two years ago.
When The Post and
UMD asked in December 2021 whether Biden was legitimately elected, 69% of Americans said he was. Now, that’s down to 62%. Slightly fewer Republicans today (31%) say Biden’s election was legitimate compared with 2021 (39%). More than one-third of Americans, or 36%, do not accept Biden’s victory as legitimate.
Older Americans are slightly more likely than younger ones to say Biden was legitimately elected, as are voters with college degrees. About 3 in 10 people who get most of their information from Fox News think Biden won legitimately in 2020.
Several voters interviewed by The Post cited what they said was evidence of voter fraud, in particular the long-debunked claim that Georgia election workers were caught on video putting fake ballots into tallies. The two women in that video recently won a $148 million judgment against former Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani for spreading those defamatory claims.
A THREAT TO DEMOCRACY?
Most Americans, 55%, believe the storming of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6,
2021, was “an attack on democracy that should never be forgotten,” with majorities of Democrats and independents holding this view. But most Republicans and Trump voters reject this view.
More than 7 in 10 Republicans say too much is being made of the attack and that it is “time to move on.” Fewer than 2 in 10 (18%) of Republicans say that Jan. 6 protesters were “mostly violent,” dipping from 26% in 2021. Currently, 77% of Democrats and 54% of independents say the protesters were mostly violent, little changed from 2021.
“There were so many people that felt the election was rigged. It was not right for them to break in like that, but they were fed up and frustrated and they were whipped into a frenzy by the FBI and others,” said Colleen Michaels, 59, of Woodsfield, Ohio.
A Republican voter, Michaels heard from people who went to the Capitol. Those conversations and security footage released to and selectively edited by former Fox News host Tucker Carlson lead her to believe in the conspiracy theory that undercover FBI agents instigated the riot.
Other Trump supporters place more blame on the rioters. Peggy Orr, 67, of North Platte, Neb., is a Republican who thinks the rioters did threaten democracy, even though she did not believe the 2020 election was legitimate.
“I’ve never joined a protest or tried to break windows because I didn’t like the way the election went, and I don’t think people should,” Orr said. “You have to accept the results.”
The Post-UMD poll finds that 55% of Republicans think legal punishments for the people who broke into the Capitol have been “fair” or “not harsh enough,” though that is down from 64% in 2021. Seven in 10 independents and about 9 in 10 Democrats say punishments have been fair or insufficient.
FEWER REPUBLICANS BLAME TRUMP
Republicans today also feel more defensive of Trump than they did in 2021. Two years ago, 60% of Americans overall said Trump bears “a great deal” or “a good amount” of responsibility for the attack; now, 53% do. Again, Republicans are driving that change — 14% assign him a great or good amount of culpability, about half as many as did in 2021 (27%).
“In the beginning when I heard about it, I was very upset that Trump didn’t come out and say, ‘Stop,’ ” said Gloria Bowden of Jacksonville, a 68-year-old independent voter who leans Republican. But now, having seen video clips of police using tear gas and rubber bullets on rioters, she thinks the attack was instigated by law enforcement.
“I still wish he would have [told people to leave the Capitol earlier], but I don’t know that it would have mattered,” Bowden said.
“It was planned.”