Gallup Poll Finds Sharp Partisan Gap in US Election Trust Ahead of Midterms

With the US midterm elections less than a month away, a new Gallup survey has uncovered a striking level of skepticism about the honesty of the country's voting system, particularly among Republicans and independent voters. The findings, released on Wednesday, suggest that confidence in election integrity has become deeply entangled with partisan identity at a moment when the country is preparing for a nationally consequential vote.

According to the polling data, only 37 percent of Republicans said they have confidence in the US electoral system. Independents registered similarly low levels of trust, with just 35 percent expressing confidence. By contrast, 63 percent of Democrats said they believed the elections would be conducted honestly, creating a gap of roughly 26 percentage points between the two major party coalitions.

The overall national picture is evenly split, with 49 percent of Americans saying they are confident in the honesty of elections and 51 percent saying they are not. That near-even division is unchanged from the last midterm election cycle in 2022, indicating that the erosion of trust has not faded with time but has instead settled into a durable pattern.

What makes the current moment unusual, according to Gallup, is the way confidence now correlates with views of the president. In 2025, the first year of Donald Trump's second term, confidence was nominally higher among those who approved of the country's leadership, at 51 percent, compared with 45 percent among those who disapproved. That relationship has since inverted.

Gallup noted that since Trump's return to the White House, the traditional link between approval of national leadership and trust in elections has effectively disappeared. Trust in US election integrity is now markedly higher among those who disapprove of Trump's leadership, at 52 percent, than among those who approve, at 41 percent. Gallup described this as a "highly unusual" pattern when measured against global norms.

The polling organisation said the United States is the only country out of more than 100 surveyed annually over the past 15 years to display this particular inversion. In most nations, people who approve of their government tend to express greater confidence in the electoral process. In 2025, 70 percent of people globally who approved of their national leadership voiced confidence in the honesty of their elections, compared with just 30 percent of those who disapproved.

The contrast with the recent American past is stark. Under former President Joe Biden, 81 percent of Americans who approved of the government said they were confident in elections, while only 30 percent of those who disapproved felt the same. That earlier alignment fit the standard international pattern, in which trust in elections generally tracks with support for those in power.

The findings carry potential consequences for the November midterms, which will determine control of Congress and shape the remaining years of Trump's presidency. Gallup suggested the unusual divide could raise questions about whether significant portions of the electorate will accept the legitimacy of the results once they are certified.

The survey data arrives against a backdrop of heightened scrutiny of US election administration. In September, the US Supreme Court rejected plans put forward by Trump concerning postal ballots, a decision that underscored ongoing legal and political battles over how Americans cast their votes. Around the same time, election officials across the country were reported to be preparing for potential chaos before the midterms, reflecting concerns about misinformation, procedural disputes and the possibility of contested outcomes.

Trump himself has remained defiant about his party's midterm prospects, telling supporters at a rally in Ohio over the weekend that Republicans could prevail despite the political headwinds. His public comments and continued engagement with election-related issues have kept the topic at the centre of national debate, even as local officials work to reassure voters about the security of the process.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment on the Gallup findings, leaving the administration's position on the trust gap unaddressed. The silence is notable given the degree to which the survey results point to a divergence between confidence in elections and support for the sitting leadership.

Taken together, the numbers describe a country entering a pivotal election season with a deeply fractured sense of shared reality about how votes are counted and whether they are counted fairly. The partisan divide over election integrity, once an occasional feature of American political life, now appears entrenched, with independents joining Republicans in expressing substantial doubt. Whether that doubt translates into reduced turnout, post-election disputes or a broader challenge to the legitimacy of the results remains an open question as the midterms approach.