Report · Jan 21, 2020
Politics & Global Warming, November 2019
By Anthony Leiserowitz, Edward Maibach, Seth Rosenthal, John Kotcher, Parrish Bergquist, Abel Gustafson, Matthew Ballew and Matthew Goldberg
Filed under: Policy & Politics, Beliefs & Attitudes and Behaviors & Actions
1. The Politics of Global Warming Beliefs
1.1. Most registered voters think global warming is happening.
About seven in ten registered voters (73%) think global warming is happening. This includes nearly all liberal Democrats (95%), a large majority of moderate/conservative Democrats (89%), and two in three liberal/moderate Republicans (66%). In contrast, only about four in ten conservative Republicans (41%) think global warming is happening.
1.2. A majority of registered voters think global warming is caused mostly by human activities.
A majority of registered voters (59%) think global warming is caused mostly by human activities. This includes about eight in ten liberal Democrats (84%), and about seven in ten moderate/conservative Democrats (72%).
About half of liberal/moderate Republicans (51%), but only about one in four conservative Republicans (25%), think global warming is mostly human-caused.
1.3. Two in three registered voters are worried about global warming.
Two in three registered voters (66%) are “very” or “somewhat” worried about global warming. This includes large majorities of liberal Democrats (94%) and moderate/conservative Democrats (88%). Over the past five years (since our October 2014 survey), the percentage of moderate/conservative Democrats worried about global warming has increased by 20 percentage points (see Data Tables, p. 28).
About half of liberal/moderate Republicans (53%) are worried about global warming. Only one in four conservative Republicans (26%) are worried.
