Polling shows growing number of Republicans identify with the MAGA movement
As President Donald Trump nears the 100-day mark of his second term, recent polling from NBC News shows how he has consolidated the Republican Party not just around himself, but also around his broader “Make America Great Again” movement.
Thirty-six percent of registered voters identified themselves as MAGA supporters in the March NBC News poll. It’s a significant increase from past NBC polling — up from 23% of respondents in a merged sample of all of NBC’s polling across 2023 and 27% of respondents in a merged sample of NBC’s 2024 polling.
The overall share is powered by the 71% of Republicans who now call themselves MAGA supporters.
NBC News’ polling already showed signs of a shift afoot between the beginning of the 2024 presidential primary and the final weeks before Election Day, as the GOP consolidated around Trump. In January 2024, days after Trump won nominating contests in Iowa and New Hampshire, just 20% of registered voters said they aligned with the MAGA movement. But in NBC News’ combined polling in October and early November 2024, that number had ticked up to 29%.
A shift among Republicans moving more into Trump’s camp is primarily driving this movement, with a 16-point increase in GOPers identifying with the MAGA movement between the two polls right before the 2024 election (55%) and March this year (71%). There’s also been a similar shift among college-educated men, from 21% in 2024 to 37% in March — also a 16 point increase.
It’s the kind of pro-Trump consolidation that led to him matching his best-ever approval rating (47%) in NBC News’ March poll, though a majority of registered voters, 51%, still disapproved of his job performance.
“All of that shift is coming from Republicans,” said Bill McInturff, a Republican pollster with Public Opinion Strategies who conducted the survey along with Democratic pollster Jeff Horwitt of Hart Research Associates.
“Look at this transformed party, where in 14 months we’ve gone from 40% of Republicans from saying they identify as MAGA to 71%,” McInturff continued.
The NBC News poll surveyed 1,000 registered voters from March 7-11 via a mix of telephone interviews and an online survey sent via text message. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.
