KSTP/SurveyUSA poll: 'hush money' trial has no impact on Minnesota presidential election

After a solid month of mostly negative and occasionally sordid testimony in former President Donald Trump's “hush money” trial, the presumptive Republican nominee still faces Democratic President Joe Biden. This continues to be a virtual dead heat.

The latest KSTP-TV/SurveyUSA poll shows Mr. Biden leading Mr. Trump 44% to 42%, the same result as the previous poll conducted in April, just before the trial began.

The survey included 39% of people who described themselves as Democrats, 35% of Republicans and 22% of independents.

“This race is close,” said Stephen Shear, a political analyst at Carleton University. “It's been a few months. I think this was a surprise to a lot of people in national politics. The Trump campaign now believes Minnesota is a likely target for victory in the 2024 election.”

Trump is on trial on charges that he authorized the payments to keep salacious stories out of the news that could have influenced the 2016 presidential election and concealed the true intentions of the payments.

We asked registered voters and eligible voters who said they supported Trump whether their support would shift away from him if convicted. According to the poll, 88% of people said they would continue to vote for Trump. Zero percent said they would switch to Biden, and 5% said they would consider moving to another candidate.

That last number is small, but it can have a big impact in very close races, Shear said.

“A conviction in this case could be a big problem for President Trump,” Shear said. “That could be the difference between a close victory and a close loss in Minnesota.”

SurveyUSA interviewed 825 Minnesota adults from May 8-11. Among adults, 710 were confirmed to be registered to vote. SurveyUSA determined that 625 of his registered voters are likely to vote in his November general election.

The survey was conducted online using a non-probability sample of randomly selected online adult panelists by Lucid Holdings, LLC in New Orleans. Total survey respondents were weighted to her ACS goals for the U.S. Census on gender, age, race, education, homeownership, and recall of the 2020 presidential vote.

The full survey results can be viewed below.