(CN) — Nine months out from the 2024 general election, most Americans are united in making that day a holiday — and divided on issues of voter registration and ballot delivery, according to a study published Wednesday by Pew.
The survey of 5,140 Americans highlights bipartisan support for many election policies.
“It's important from our perspective, to give Americans a sense of where their fellow Americans stand on things on voting policies, as we head into this election so when these issues come up, they can see where their views align, or don't align with other members of the public,” said Jocelyn Kiley, associate director of research at Pew.
The survey parsed out which election policies unite and divide Americans along party lines — as well as along ideological fractures within parties.
By far, the policy with the most bipartisan support among Americans would be to require paper copies of ballots for electronic voting machines. The move was supported by 82% of people polled, including 82% of Democrats and 85% of Republicans.
Interestingly, the paper ballot issue is one where liberal-leaning Democrats’ views align closer to Conservative-leaning Republicans than with moderates of either party.
“For the most part public opinion on these voting policies is consistent with what we've seen in past years,” Kiley said. “Sometimes the conventional wisdom doesn't necessarily talk about the areas where there is bipartisan agreement around voting policy.”
A majority of Americans also supported having to show a photo ID to vote, although the measure was more popular among Republicans (95%) than Democrats (69%).
More than 70% of people polled would allow in-person voting to start two weeks ahead of Election Day and make Election Day an official national holiday. Both proposals had greater support from Democratic voters than from Republicans.
The number of people who want to make Election Day a federal holiday increased seven points over the last six years, and is championed by liberal-leaning Democrats (88% support) along with a large share of Republicans (68%) and 69% support among moderate Democrats.
Only 69% of Americans want to see voting rights restored to felons who have completed their sentences — including 60% of Republicans and 80% of Democrats. Party moderates align fairly closely on the issue, but there is a 33-point gap between the number of conservative Republicans and liberal Democrats who say they favor the policy.
Republicans were less likely than Democrats to support policies that expanded registration and voting options, including allowing anyone to vote by mail, automatically registering eligible voters and letting people register to vote at the polls on Election Day. Despite clear partisan divides, these measures each garnered support from 57% of the total people polled.
Fewer people want to see voters register at the polls today compared to 2018, when the measure was supported by 64% of people polled. Pew researchers attributed the decline to lower Republican support.
While voting by mail remains overall popular, support for the measure also represents the greatest divide among Conservative Republicans (21%) and liberal Democrats (93%).
Pew’s last pulse on mail-in voting was taken in April 2020, early in the Covid-19 pandemic and months before scrutiny into election security increased.
“At the time, we found nearly nine in 10 Democrats and about half of Republicans supported allowing any voter to vote by mail if they want to,” Kiley explained. “Democratic support for that hasn't really changed since 2020, but only 28% of Republicans now say that any voter should be able to vote by mail if they want to. That's a pretty significant change.”
Support for voting by mail can differ between states where it is more or less common, though partisanship remains embedded in the issue.
“It is generally true that people who live in states with more prevalence of vote by mail are more supportive of it than people who live in states where it's less common, but there are still wide partisan divides even when you control for that,” Kiley observed.
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