By far, inflation is the No. 1 issue in rural America ahead of the midterm elections, said the Daily Yonder Rural Poll on Monday. Six of every 10 of the likely voters in the survey said they would vote for Republicans in congressional races, roughly the same margin won by former president Trump in 2020; three in 10 said they would vote for Democrats.
“Rural America is in a pretty Republican mood,” said pollster Celinda Lake, who conducted the survey. Lake is a Democrat.
Three-quarters of participants said the economy was not working well for them and half said they expected their personal financial situations would worsen in the year ahead.
Some 45 percent of respondents said “the rising cost of living” was the most important issue in the elections, followed by “dysfunction in government,” 28 percent; “retirement and Social Security,” 19 percent; “abortion and women’s rights,” 17 percent; and, “jobs and the economy,” 15 percent. “Crime” and “health care” each got 13 percent, “climate change” 12 percent, “immigration” 10 percent and “taxes” 9 percent.
Republicans said the two most important issues were the cost of living and government dysfunction. Democrats chose abortion and women’s rights and climate change.
Inflation also was the dominant issue among voters nationwide, according to a Pew Research Center poll released last week. “As has been the case all year, the economy is clearly the top issue for voters,” said Pew. “Just 17 percent of U.S. adults say the economy is in excellent or good shape.” The survey of registered voters found that 41 percent said they would vote for a Democrat and 40 percent would vote for a Republican in their districts, with 18 percent undecided or backing a third-party candidate.
Lake said rural voters gave even more prominence to the economy than the rest of the nation. She told the Daily Yonder it was “really different than what we’ve seen in the past and really different from what we’re seeing in the rest of the country, as pessimistic as the rest of the country is.”
The Rural Poll surveyed 400 likely rural voters in 11 battleground states; Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Michigan, Missouri, New Hampshire, Nevada, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. They survey was conducted by telephone and text-to-online from Oct. 13-17.