US May Be Entering Moderate Moment As Voters Reject Radicalism, Poll Suggests

Many Americans favor more moderate candidates in a hypothetical 2028 contest, according to an Emerson College Polling survey released Thursday.

The newly released poll found that in a hypothetical 2028 presidential election matchup, 48% of voters supported a moderate Republican, while 36% backed a progressive Democrat and 16% were undecided. By comparison, 47% of respondents said they would support a moderate Democrat in 2028, while 38% said they would vote for a “Make America Great Again” (MAGA) Republican and 14% remained undecided, per the survey.

“It is clear that a moderate candidate on both the Democratic and Republican side has appeal toward independent voters that a label of progressive or MAGA does not appeal to: the ‘moderate Democrat’ has a 17-point advantage over the MAGA Republican and the ‘moderate Republican’ has an 18-point advantage over the ‘progressive Democrat,’” Spencer Kimball, executive director of Emerson College Polling, said in a statement.

Additionally, 39% of voters said they would vote for a moderate Democratic candidate in the next presidential election, while 44% said the same about a moderate GOP candidate and 17% were undecided, the survey shows.

Moreover, the same poll showed Democrats leading the generic 2026 congressional ballot by just two percentage points, appearing to blunt early projections that the upcoming midterm elections would be a “blue wave.”

Forty-four percent of voters said they would back the Democratic candidate, 42% said they would support the Republican candidate and 15% were undecided, according to the poll. Meanwhile, independents broke for the Democratic candidate 40% to 32%, while 28% said they were undecided, the survey shows.

Several far-left candidates have notched electoral victories this year, including Democratic Seattle Mayor-elect and self-described socialist Katie Wilson and Democratic New York City mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, who is similarly a self-avowed socialist. A Gallup poll released in September found that 42% of Democrats said they held a positive view of capitalism, while 66% held a positive view of socialism.

Both the GOP and Democrats have reportedly been developing messaging strategies as the 2026 midterms loom. While some recent polling has indicated that many Americans are concerned about the current state of the economy, President Donald Trump vowed during a Wednesday speech that the U.S. will experience an “economic boom” next year.

Republican National Committee (RNC) Chairman Joe Gruters wrote in a Dec. 12 X post that the GOP “will win in 2026.” However, Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chairman Ken Martin has suggested this year that Republicans “should be nervous” for the upcoming midterms.

The Emerson College survey was conducted Dec. 14-15. The overall sample of U.S. registered voters, n=1,000, has a credibility interval, similar to a poll’s margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points. The data sets were weighted by gender, education, race, age, party registration, and region based on U.S. Census parameters and voter file data.