A new poll shows that a significant minority of Americans under in 50 would support various forms of political violence, including bloody revolutions and assassinations of political figures.
The poll from far left pressure group Southern Poverty Law Center shows that there was significant minority support for political violence among Americans, with a majority of both Democrats and Republicans seeing each other as serious threats to the country, at a rate of 63% and 67% respectively.
When asked if “some violence might be necessary to protect the country from radical extremists,” 29% of independents, 34% of Democrats, and 41% of Republicans agreed. A majority of Republicans believe that a civil war is likely in the near future, with 39% of Democrats agreeing.
Questions around specific acts of political violence saw a sharp divide in the attitude of Americans under 50 years old and those older. In Americans over 50 across sexes and partisan lines, approval for participating in a violent revolution or assassinating a politician ranged from 6% to 11% at a maximum.
However, the support for those politically violent acts ranged between 30% and 45% when questioning Americans under 50. Women overall were less likely to support political violence than their male counterparts of the same age category.
The poll shows that nearly one half of Democrat men under 50 support political violence only days after a man who police say sought to assassinate Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh in a murder suicide was arrested outside his home.
The widest partisan gap on those questions from the under 50 demographic was between younger Republican and Democrat men. When asked if they approved of “assassinating a politician who is harming the country or our democracy,” 34% of younger Republican men said they supported it, as opposed to 44% of younger Democrat men.
Holy crap. An *SPLC* poll finds that nearly half of young male Democrats approve of “assassinating a politician who is harming our country or democracy." pic.twitter.com/3yrhCUkDAb
— Vince Coglianese (@VinceCoglianese) June 8, 2022
The SPLC noted that more respondents approved of threatening or assassinating politicians that they thought were harmful to the country than the destruction of private or public property when protesting.
The poll comes as a 26-year-old leftist from California, Nicholas John Roske, turned up to conservative Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s house, armed with a handgun and zip ties. Roske allegedly told authorities that he planned to kill Kavanaugh and then himself, and was angry with the draft leaked opinion that would overturn Roe v. Wade, and the shooting in Uvalde, Texas.
