Marquette poll: voter enthusiasm low, independent voter importance

Marquette Law Poll: Independent voter importance

Independent voters will play a key roll in the 2024 presidential election in Wisconsin

CEDARBURG, Wis. - Independent voters in this swing state have a key role in who wins the White House. Wisconsin's swing voters in 2022 helped the state elect a Democratic governor and a Republican senator. This year, they have 200 more days to decide who will win their vote.

A barometer in the swing state can be found in a swing city: Cedarburg. The city voted for Republican presidential nominees for decades, but in 2020, they picked Democrat Joe Biden. He won Cedarburg by just 19 votes.

This year features a rematch.

"Living in a swing city, state is just making me more aware of the importance of getting out there," said Alumah, a resident who did not want to use her last name. "I’ve already seen five people say they aren’t voting [...] because they don’t like either candidate. That to me is naïve, and stupid and ludicrous."

That lack of enthusiasm is found in this week's Marquette University Law School poll.

It finds only 47% of overall Wisconsin voters say they're "very enthusiastic" about voting this fall.

In March, four years ago, 67% said they were "very enthusiastic."

Marquette University Law School poll data

The Marquette poll in January showed President Joe Biden and former president Donald Trump tied. This week's poll finds Trump with a lead of 51 to 49%, a race so close it's within the margin of error.

Part of this change is that independent voters are now going with the former president. He's getting 59% of independents, while the president is getting 41%.

In January, the same poll found Wisconsin independents backed Biden 49% to 42%.

Marquette University Law School poll data

"Independents do matter, and so we’ll certainly pay attention to them, and they have shifted the most, from January until now," said Charles Franklin, director of the Marquette Law School Poll. "But it is a group that is classic for changing their mind from month to month. And it’s a small sample in every survey."

FREE DOWNLOAD: Get breaking news alerts in the FOX6 News app for iOS or Android.

As those independents make up their minds, here are the issues they say are most important as they weigh who should win the White House:

31% said the economy
23% said immigration and border security
14% said Medicare and social security
9% said foreign relations
8% said healthcare

Marquette University Law School poll data

"The recipe is there: both candidates, both Democratic and Republican candidates being more negatively viewed than positively," said Franklin. "That’s 17% that don’t like either one of them. Those are certainly the ingredients for a third party to do unusually well."

In a five-way matchup, the Marquette poll still finds the former president with a one-point lead.

The Green Party has already secured a place on the ballot, and supporters of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. are hoping to get him on the ballot. They can't start asking for signatures until July, and they'll need 2,000.