Poll: Americans would rather elect Darth Vader than Donald Trump

By Charles Pulliam-Moore  |  December 15, 2015 | 9:17pm
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According to a new poll, if given the choice, more young Americans would rather elect a psychotic galactic overlord with a taste for genocide as their next president than Donald Trump.

Ipsos, the the D.C.-based brand research firm that conducted the poll, asked more than 1,000 participants how they would vote if characters from a galaxy far, far away were included on next year’s presidential ballot.

You could argue that the poll’s findings were influenced by the impending release of The Force Awakens, but this isn’t the first time that Darth Vader has tested with American voters. Last year, FiveThirtyEight found that long before this election season’s debates began, the American public was already more receptive to the idea of the iconic Sith Lord becoming the leader of our country.

In a press release, Ipsos VP Chris Jackson mused that the current state of American politics might be responsible for peoples’ apparent preference for fictional characters over real-world politicians.

“This data suggests that the Jedi Order is vastly more popular than either the Republican or Democratic Party,” Jackson said. “It seems that the Force could ‘surround us and bind the universe together.’”

Trump losing to Vader aside, the poll’s findings were pretty on-point, given the premise behind the poll.

Though Trump would lose to Vader (18% of the vote for Trump versus 27% for Vader), both Yoda and Hillary Clinton would soundly trounce Vader. Clinton would snag 32% of the vote compared to 16% going to Vader.

It’s unclear which side of the Force Clinton has aligned herself with, but were she to go head to head with Yoda, the little green Jedi master would beat her in a general election. Fifty percent of respondents reported that they’d cast their vote for Yoda while only 25% said that they would back Clinton.

As Ipsos points out, though this is all fun to muse about, it’s all ultimately for naught considering that Star Wars is set in the distant past and none of the characters meet the basic requirements of being American citizens to actually run for political office.

Fusion is partly owned by ABC, a member of the Disney family.

 
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