Poll finds more Republicans would vote for a candidate accused of sexual harassment than would not

A Quinnipiac University poll published Tuesday found that 62 percent of American voters would not vote for a candidate accused of sexual harassment by multiple women, but that Republican voters were far more willing to vote for accused sexual harassers. Across every demographic category of age, gender, race, and education level, a majority of voters said that they would "definitely not vote" for the hypothetically accused candidate. It was only when Quinnipiac sorted voters by partisan affiliation that they found a single group where a relative majority was willing to vote for an accused sexual harasser: Republicans.

While every single demographic and partisan category — including 82 percent of Republicans — strongly believed that sexual harassment of women is a serious problem, 43 percent of Republican voters said they still would vote for a candidate accused multiple times of such conduct. Only 41 percent said they would not vote for the candidate. By comparison, 81 percent of Democrats, 61 percent of independents, 53 percent of men, and 70 percent of women said they would not vote for that candidate.

Similarly, 49 percent of Republican voters contacted by Quinnipiac said that Alabama Republican Senate candidate Roy Moore, who has been accused of sexual misconduct with minors, should not be expelled by the Senate if he is elected. In every other demographic category, save for white men, a majority of voters believed that Moore should be expelled if he wins the seat.

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Republican voters were also the only group in the poll to believe (by a 66 percent to 27 percent margin) that President Trump, who has been accused of sexual assault by many women, "respects women just as much as he respects men."