Party over purity: US voters unlikely to turn backs on troubled candidates, Reuters/Ipsos poll finds

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https://www.reuters.com/world/party-over-purity-us-voters-unlikely-turn-backs-troubled-candidates-reutersipsos-2026-06-09/

Party over purity: US voters unlikely to turn backs on troubled candidates, Reuters/Ipsos poll finds
By Jason Lange and Nolan D. McCaskill
June 9, 2026 5:04 AM CDT

WASHINGTON, June 9 (Reuters) - Few Americans would abandon their party's candidate over controversies such as Democrat Graham Platner's ​Nazi-linked tattoo in Maine or Republican Ken Paxton's fraud indictment in Texas, according to a new Reuters/Ipsos poll, highlighting deep partisan divides that make winning paramount.

Two-thirds ‌of party-aligned respondents said they sometimes have to vote for a candidate they don't like just to stop the other party from winning power, according to the six-day poll completed on Monday.

That principle will be put to the test in a Maine primary election on Tuesday, when Democratic oyster farmer Platner hopes to become a candidate for a Senate seat seen as crucial to Democrats' hopes of winning a majority in that chamber in November.

In a ​nationwide poll, just 17% of Democrats familiar with Platner said his tattoo of a Nazi-style skull-and-crossbones would stop them from voting for him if they could vote in ​Maine's election.

The same share of Republicans nationwide said they would refrain from voting for Texas Attorney General Paxton, who was indicted a decade ago ⁠on charges of defrauding investors, if they could vote in the state's Senate election in November.





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Platner's tattoo is a joke compared to Paxton's long documented record of crime and corruption