Facing dozens of federal charges, former President Donald Trump is gaining support among Republicans and Republican-leaning independents as he ramps up his 2024 campaign, according to the latest PBS NewsHour/NPR/Marist poll.
Seventy-six percent of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents said they hold a favorable view of Trump – up 8 percentage points since mid-February. At the same time, about three-quarters of Americans overall think the leading Republican candidate for president has done something either illegal or unethical.
During the same week that Trump pleaded not guilty to felony charges tied to his possession of classified documents, a majority of Americans – 56 percent – say the twice-impeached and twice-indicted former president should drop out of the 2024 race for the White House. That includes nearly all Democrats and most independents. Meanwhile, 43 percent of Americans overall say Trump should continue his campaign – including almost all Republicans.
Chart by Jenna Cohen/PBS NewsHour
Looking at this latest snapshot of public opinion, a majority of independents are still siding with Democrats against Trump, said Lara Brown, a political scientist who directs the Graduate School of Political Management at George Washington University. But a lot can change between now and the primaries, which are several months away, she said.
"You can't read this as what is today will be tomorrow," Brown said.
But thinking about their appeal among independent voters, Republicans do have cause for concern, according to Republican strategist Douglas Heye. Today's independents are often people who voted for Trump in 2016 and Biden in 2020. They flipped their votes, he said, because "they're exhausted of all of this."
Trump's alleged misconduct continues to make U.S. presidential history. Shortly after the federal indictment against Trump was unsealed on June 9, Special Counsel Jack Smith said in a statement that the charges against Trump amounted to "felony violations of our national security laws" and "conspiracy to obstruct justice." Smith urged the public to read the indictment against Trump.
"Our laws that protect national defense information are critical to the safety and security of the United States and they must be enforced," Smith said. "Violations of those laws put our country at risk."
WATCH: National security experts weigh in on Trump's alleged mishandling of classified documents
In a Miami federal courthouse on June 12, Trump pleaded not guilty to 37 federal charges tied to his alleged mishandling of classified documents after he left the White House, including obstructing attempts from government officials to retrieve the documents and making false statements.
As part of the Department of Justice's indictment, federal investigators submitted photos showing boxes of classified documents stacked in a bathroom, across a ballroom stage, and in several other locations around his Mar-a-Lago resort.
Chart by Jenna Cohen/PBS NewsHour
During campaign rallies and public appearances, Trump tells his voters he is being attacked and that "nobody else plays by the rules, so Donald Trump shouldn't have to play by the rules either," Republican strategist Douglas Heye said. GOP leaders have previously criticized Trump's legal scandals as a distraction that could jeopardize their election chances. However, after the latest indictment, Republican lawmakers have been more likely to find fault with the charges and Biden administration than Trump's alleged actions, according to a New York Times analysis.
READ MORE: Read the full Trump indictment on mishandling of classified documents
For years, the American public has watched a growing number of legal controversies encircle Trump. The American public tends to give people "the benefit of the doubt," Brown said. That doubt is supported by "our cultural and legal belief in the presumption of innocence." But she added that if a majority of "Americans believe you've done something illegal or unethical, it's going to be very hard to be elected in a general election – period."
This would not be the first time Trump has stared down a scandal and held on to his party base. In this latest poll, two-thirds of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents say they are more likely to support Trump as their party's standard bearer. Only a third said they would most likely back another GOP candidate as the party nominee. Trump's campaign said he raised $6.6 million in the days since this latest round of federal charges became public.
"Donald Trump has obviously been able to suspend the normal political laws of gravity and done so for a while," Heye said.
How should Democrats strategize?
With this latest legal challenge, Trump is drawing more political attention that focuses largely on himself and not on policy problems facing the country, Brown said. Democrats would do well to remember that "this is a Republican problem – not a Democratic problem," Brown added.
Chart by Jenna Cohen/PBS NewsHour
"Every day he takes up the oxygen in U.S. media is another day that Americans aren't focused on Biden's presidency and his leadership and another day that [the] Democratic Party and President Biden are getting a pass," she said.
It is in Democrats' interests for Republicans to continue to rally around Trump, Brown added. If a different candidate is nominated to represent the Republican Party, Brown said, this could put Democrats in a position where their nominee must debate a Republican on issues, rather than continue to focus on the fallout around Trump.
These latest poll numbers serve as a reminder that increasingly, Americans live in "separate silos and [that] people [are] picking what they want to hear right now," said Lee Miringoff, who directs the Marist College Institute for Public Opinion. "The Trump argument right now is very strong for the Republican base."
The PBS NewsHour, NPR and Marist Poll conducted a survey between June 12 and June 14 that polled 1,327 U.S. adults with a margin of error of 3.5 percentage points and 1,212 registered voters with a margin of error of 3.6 percentage points.