2016 Presidential Election Survey

We’re doing things a little differently for this special edition of Insights. Normally, the findings we present you guys with consist of anonymized and automatically collected data that’s compiled by our analytics software. As a part of a collaboration with Mic.com, everything that we’re reporting on today has been tallied up following a special survey that was featured on Pornhub over the course of the last few months. The Pornhub Political Survey ran from December 21, 2015 through February 29, 2016 and was completed by over 371,000 Pornhub viewers. Touching on everything from abortion laws to Donald Trump, this special edition report is fascinating in that it shows not only how Pornhub viewers feel about certain key issues leading up to the November election, but also how views have shifted over the course of the past few weeks.

Which 2016 Presidential Candidate are you most likely to support?

We started our survey by asking a big question – make that THE big question. Which 2016 presidential candidate are you most likely to support?

Using the survey responses from February 22nd to 29th, republican voters felt that Donald Trump handily beat his rivals with an sizable 60.5% of the poll.  The rest of voters were nearly divided between Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz with just under 20% each.

Pornhub’s democrat voters were feeling the bern – with Bernie Sanders sweeping up 73.4% of the vote, leaving only 26.6% supporting Hillary Clinton.  At least our Pornhub users in the United States know what they like.

Combining the results from both parties, Bernie Sanders beats out Donald Trump 31.1% to 19.6%.  Hillary Clinton’s 11.2% nearly doubled the support of Marco Rubio at 6.4% and Ted Cruz at 6.3%.  The second highest survey response of 25.4% came from people who apparently supported “none of them”.

Presidential Candidate’s Support Over Time

So how did the candidates fare over time?  We looked at weekly responses from the beginning of our survey on December 21, 2015 and it seems that most Pornhub users made up their mind early on.  Sanders has topped our survey from the start, just a few percentage points ahead of Trump and nearly 10 points ahead of Clinton.

The gap started to widen around mid-January, when it seems that the decrease in support for both Trump and Clinton went directly to Sanders.  Cruz and Rubio played a close game during the entire length of our survey.

Sander’s biggest support group comes from respondents aged 18-34.  He started with an 8 point lead over Trump in December and ended with a 16 point lead on February 29th.  Trumps main support comes from post-millennials where he retained a solid lead throughout our survey.  Support for Bernie Sanders started at just 9% with over 35’s while Hillary had a solid 24%.  Sanders grew steadily throughout our survey, and by the end he and Clinton were neck and neck.

Regionally, Bernie Sanders leads in the West, while trailing in the south.  Trump support started strongly in the Midwest, but eventually his support evened out around 20% in all regions but the West where only 15% of his supporters are found. Clinton’s strongest support comes from the Northeast, although she has dropped in all regions throughout February.  Throughout our survey’s Clinton’s weak spot has been the Midwest.  Rubio and Cruz see their biggest support come from the Southern United States.

In the final week of our survey, women’s support for Bernie Sanders was slightly stronger than men at 33.9% versus 30.7%.  Donald Trump’s 20.3% among men was much stronger than his 11.8% of women voters.  Clinton’s popularity among women respondents was 17.4% compared to 10.6% of men.  Cruz and Rubio we both more popular among men.  The number of respondents who didn’t care for any of the candidates was nearly equal for men and women – slightly over 25%.

What are your views on marijuana legalization in the United States?

Over 55% of Pornhub users who responded to our survey are fully for the legalization of marijuana.  We’re not that surprised, as we found that weed porn was a common search in our Up in Smoke Insights post.  A further 15% of respondents felt it was ok for medical reasons, but only 6.4% were completely against it.

Support for legalization was strongest with people aged 26 to 35 and 36-45 — both groups exceed 60%.  We were surprised to see 18-25 year olds had a lower level of support at only 54.2%.  The strongest support for legalization came from Bernie Sander’s supporters at 71.6%, followed by Trump voters at 52.7%.  Ted Cruz supporters felt the most strongly that it should remain illegal, although still a paltry 11.7% of them.

What are your thoughts on gun control?

Over 31% of Pornhub users are strongly against gun control, while 27% feel that mental and psychological analysis should be part of the checking process.  17% feel that current checks could be improved in “firearm friendly” states, but only 12.8% say that banning firearms completely will help to put a stop to gun violence.  Men are much more likely than women to firmly uphold the 2nd amendment, as are the 46 to 55 age group.

Nearly 55% of Donald Trump supporters feel strongly about protecting the 2nd amendment, and have the least support for banning firearms and improving background checks. 23.8% of Hillary Clinton supporters feel that firearms should be banned completely, the largest group of all our Pornhub respondents.  The biggest support for improving existing background checks comes from Bernie Sanders voters.

Domestic surveillance: A justifiable safety net or a gross violation of privacy rights?

Over one third of Pornhub users think that the Patriot Act and domestic surveillance is a complete violation of their rights.  Only 9.3% feel that surveillance is necessary for their safety, but 29.1% are ok if proper oversight is maintained in order to deter domestic terrorism.

Support for the Patriot Act increases according to the age of our respondents, peaking over 19% for those aged 56 and above.  Almost 40% of people in the 26-35 age group feel strongest that it’s a violation of their rights, and 30% of 18-25 year olds don’t yet have a view on surveillance.  14% of Donald Trump supporters are most likely to feel that surveillance is necessary, and 41.5% of Bernie Sanders supporters feel strongest that it’s a violation of their rights.

Climate change: Foreseeable danger or a manufactured myth?

Over 53% of Pornhub’s users feel that climate change is a foreseeable danger, while 20.8% feel it’s a myth and not caused by industrial human activity.  Democratic voters are much more likely to believe in the dangers of climate change than republicans – 75% for Sanders and 62% for Clinton.  Younger Pornhub users have stronger feelings about the realities of climate change compared to older ones.  More of Ted Cruz’s supporters believe that Climate Change is a myth than real, although Donald Trump’s supporters are about equal in their beliefs for or against it.

College debt: Is higher learning too expensive, or are complaints unjustified?

57.4% of Pornhub users feel that higher education is way too expensive, and many struggle to repay student loans. Unsurprisingly, younger Pornhub users are more concerned over college debt than older users.  The biggest concern comes from respondents aged 26-35, slightly more than 18-25 year olds, who perhaps haven’t felt the pinch of growing interest on their loans.

Sanders supporters are the most concerned by college debt – over 75.4% of them.  That’s in line with the 18-35 age group we found had the highest support for Bernie Sanders.  57.9% of Clinton supporters struggle with college debt, but less than half of republican voters are concerned, regardless of which candidate they support.

Should planned parenthood indeed be defunded by the government?

Planned parenthood provides a variety of services that have helped millions of women, but the most controversial service they provide tends to polarize voters to feel strongly for or against their funding. Almost 40% of Pornhub users feel that Planned Parenthood is a vital resource, but 25% would like to see abortion funding reduced except for victims of sexual crimes.  Only 9% think it should be completely defunded and dislike everything Planned Parenthood stands for.  27.6% of our respondents are on the fence and prefer not to have a view one way or another.

Planned Parenthood support among women is 43.5%, which is 5% more than support from men.  People in the 18-35 age group have the highest level of support, while those over 45 feel more strongly that it should be defunded completely.  Across all age groups, people who would like to see abortion funding reduced only range 5% from a low of 20% to a high of 25%.

Unsurprisingly, support for Planned Parenthood was strongest with democrat voters with 56.7% from team Sanders and 46.8% from team Clinton.  22.4% of Ted Cruz supporters had the strongest feelings about completely defunding it, but Marco Rubio’s were the highest group for reducing funding.  Trump supporters were nearly equal at 29% for both continuing to fund or reducing funding.

Should the United States end “Birthright Citizenship”?

In most circumstances, citizenship is granted automatically to people born in the United States.  It’s supported by 14th Amendment of the constitution, but many politicians and 7.3% of Pornhub users feel that it should be done away with.  47.1% of people responding to our survey supported this type of citizenship and felt the 14th amendment was important for the United States, which 18.8% said it should be more regulated to help control the country’s resources.

Nearly half of 18 to 25 Year Olds supported this type of citizenship, and the percentage of people who would rather do away with it grew from 5.7% to 18.6% as ages increased.  More than 15% of Donald Trump supporters would like to see “Birthright Citizenship” ended, but 40% do still support it.  Marco Rubio supporters had the largest group of people who felt that it needed more regulation.

We hope you enjoyed this special election edition of Pornhub Insights.  Would you like to see more surveys of our Pornhub visitors in the future?  If so, let us know in the comments section what questions we should ask!