Fifty-six percent of voters think President Donald Trump will benefit from the plan. | Michael B. Thomas/Getty Images Poll: Voters think Trump will benefit from tax plan

Majorities of voters think President Donald Trump and the company he built will benefit from proposed changes to the tax code, but fewer than three in 10 expect those changes to help them. And voters still want to see Trump’s tax returns before a tax bill moves forward.

That’s according to a new POLITICO/Morning Consult poll, conducted last week, that also shows opposition to the plan continuing to increase modestly among voters familiar with it, even though a plurality support the proposal.


Among those voters who have heard at least something about Republicans’ plan to change the tax code, 47 percent of voters support it and 40 percent oppose it. Support for the plan increased 2 percentage points from last week , when 45 percent of those familiar with the plan backed it. But opposition increased 4 points, up from 36 percent last week.

Voters expect that Trump will benefit personally from the changes, if enacted. Fully 56 percent of voters think the president will benefit, while only 16 percent don’t think he will. More than a quarter, 27 percent, aren’t sure.

Democrats are most likely to say the tax plan will benefit Trump; 73 percent think so. But more Republican voters also think Trump will benefit (41 percent) than think he won’t benefit (24 percent).

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Similarly, 57 percent of all voters think the Trump Organization, the company Trump founded and turned over to his two adult sons after last year’s election, will benefit from the changes. Only 14 percent don’t think the Trump Organization will benefit.

The most salient challenge for Republicans in selling the proposal is convincing voters it will help them. In the POLITICO/Morning Consult poll, only 29 percent think they and their families will benefit from the plan, while 46 percent believe they won’t benefit. A quarter of voters don’t know or have no opinion.

A 56 percent majority of Republicans think the plan will benefit them, but only 13 percent of Democrats and 22 percent of independents think they will come out better off. Nearly seven in 10 Democratic voters, 69 percent, think they won’t benefit from the plan, joined by 45 percent of independents and 20 percent of Republicans.

“The Republicans’ tax plan is broadly popular among voters, but voters are divided when asked whom the bill will help most,” said Kyle Dropp, Morning Consult’s co-founder and chief research officer. “While 46 percent of voters say the bill will benefit Trump, just 29 percent say it will benefit them personally.”

A majority of voters, 54 percent, think the president should release his tax returns before any tax reform proposal moves forward, the poll also shows. Just a quarter, 25 percent, think Trump should not have to release his tax returns before Congress advances a tax bill. More than 1 in 5 voters, 21 percent, don’t know or have no opinion.

More than 3 in 4 Democratic voters, 77 percent, think Trump should release his tax returns first. Among Republicans, 29 percent think he should release his tax returns first, while nearly half, 49 percent, think he shouldn’t have to do so.

Independents want to see Trump’s tax returns first by a wide margin, 52 percent to 19 percent.

Trump broke decades of custom — both as a candidate in last year’s presidential election and in his first year as a sitting president in the White House — by not releasing his returns.

The POLITICO/Morning Consult poll was conducted Nov. 9-11, surveying 1,993 registered voters. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus 2 percentage points.

Morning Consult is a nonpartisan media and technology company that provides data-driven research and insights on politics, policy and business strategy.

More details on the poll and its methodology can be found in these two documents — Toplines: http://politi.co/2ADtyKs | Crosstabs: http://politi.co/2yZ4pNW

