Amy Coney Barrett's Nomination Opposed by Fewer Than One-Third of Voters: Poll

Fewer than one-third of registered U.S. voters oppose Judge Amy Coney being nominated either before or after Election Day, according to a poll conducted for Newsweek by Redfield and Wilson.

Americans' views of Barrett's Supreme Court nomination by President Donald Trump are divided along party lines, but opposition to her impending Senate confirmation process is minimal. A survey of 3,000 registered voters found 39 percent support or strongly support Trump nominating a new justice before the end of his current term, while 38 percent said they oppose or strongly oppose the controversial move. But despite numerous recent polls showing a majority of Americans oppose Trump filling the vacant ninth seat before the election, voters are much less inclined to oppose Barrett specifically.

Less than one-third of voters surveyed, 31 percent, said they either oppose or strongly oppose Trump's decision to nominate Barrett for the Supreme Court seat, while 25 percent say they neither support nor oppose the Indiana native filling the vacancy of the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Similarly, just 32 percent of U.S. voters said they either oppose or strongly oppose the Republican-majority Senate confirming her before the November 3 election. Slightly more than one-third, 34 percent, say they either support or strongly support her taking the ninth seat on the bench before Election Day. The low percentage of voters either strongly for or against Barrett's confirmation are matched by relatively large percentages of people who say they either "don't know" or have no opinion either way.

An overwhelming majority of those surveyed, 83 percent, said the debate over the Supreme Court vacancy has not changed their mind on how they plan to vote for either Trump or former Vice President Joe Biden on November 3.

Critics of her nomination—or of any Trump nomination—have accused Senate Republicans and the Trump administration of filling the vacancy in order to achieve immediate political gain. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told CNN Sunday morning that Trump wants his third justice on the bench for one reason: to abolish the Affordable Care Act. Oral arguments are set to take place on November 10, one week after the election, over cases that could determine if the Obama administration's health-care law remains fully in place.

Only 43 percent of voters surveyed said they would trust the Supreme Court to come to a fair decision should the upcoming election be contested and wind up in the court.

But Senate Democrats including Vermont's Patrick Leahy and Virginia's Tim Kaine say Trump wants to quickly place a third nominee on the Supreme Court because he expects the election to be decided by the court through legal challenges, much like the outcome of the 2000 presidential election.

The polling data of the 3,000 registered voters from all political affiliations across the U.S. was collected through an online survey created by Redfield & Wilton Strategies. The pollster group is a member of the British Polling Council (BPC) and the American Association for Public Opinion Research (AAPOR) Transparency Initiative.

Newsweek reached out to the White House for any response to the poll numbers Monday afternoon.