Half of Canadians don’t trust Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, but a slight majority of them would still vote for her, according to a new poll.
An Ipsos poll for Global News found that 51 per cent of respondents would vote Clinton if they could vote in the U.S. election. This is far more than the percentage who said they would choose Republican Donald Trump – 13 per cent.
According to the poll, more people would abstain from voting entirely or choose a third party candidate than vote Trump. One in five people said they would stay home.
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CEO of Ipsos Public Affairs Darrell Bricker thinks that this could indicate dissatisfaction with the choices. “It’s not like there is a particularly inspiring choice like a Barack Obama on the ballot,” he said. However, he points out that 32 per cent of Canadians decided not to vote in their own election in 2015.
Half of respondents said that they don’t trust Hillary Clinton, according to the poll results. But for a politician, that’s not bad, said Bricker. “Most politicians don’t get that high,” he said. “In fact when you go and ask people about federal politicians in general, not naming anybody specific, it’s usually in the single digits.”
Only about 17 per cent of Canadian respondents say that they trust Donald Trump.
Trump just rubs a lot of Canadians the wrong way, said Bricker. “Tolerance is one of those things in Canada that we see as being really, really important. If there is a defining element on how Canadians feel about their country and their values, tolerance is a big part and to them, he’s come across as a very intolerant candidate.”
“And just the hucksterism, the very loud ugly American kind of part of it, is obviously something that we in our bones, that Canadians respond negatively to.”
READ MORE: Canadians would consider voting for Donald Trump-like candidate – Ipsos poll
Whatever the outcome, Canadians are watching. Fifty-eight per cent of respondents said that they were closely following the election. “It’s pretty compelling television,” said Bricker.
News media has been following the ups and downs of the campaign, but it’s also dominating social media, he said. “You’ve got people doing and saying things in national politics in the United States that normally you would only see out of very extreme candidates.”
“It’s the ultimate reality TV series.”
Exclusive Global News Ipsos polls are protected by copyright. The information and/or data may only be rebroadcast or republished with full and proper credit and attribution to “Global News Ipsos.”
This Ipsos poll on behalf of Global News was an online survey of 1,007 Canadians conducted between Oct. 28-31. The results were weighted to better reflect the composition of the adult Canadian population, according to census data. The precision of Ipsos online polls is measured using a credibility interval. In this case, the poll is considered accurate to within plus or minus 3.5 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.
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