The economy, the COVID-19 pandemic and racial injustice have emerged as top issues for U.S. voters in the 2020 presidential election.
Voters ranked the pandemic and the economy as top concerns in the race between President Donald Trump and Democratic challenger Joe Biden, according to AP VoteCast, a national survey of the electorate, released on Tuesday.
According to the survey, roughly 4 in 10 voters said the pandemic is the top concern facing the country while the economy follows close behind, the choice of about 3 in 10 voters. In a year of racial justice protests and debate over structural racism, about 1 in 10 voters cited racism as the most important issue.
The early results from the NBC News survey of early and Election Day voters also showed about a third of respondents identified the economy as the most decisive issue regarding how they voted for president. Racial inequality was the top issue for 21 percent of surveyed voters, and 18 percent said the COVID-19 crisis mattered most in their decision.
When asked about the tradeoff between containing the coronavirus and rebuilding the economy, 52 percent of voters believed controlling the pandemic, even if it hurts the economy, is more important, said the NBC News survey.
Roughly one-third of the voters called the economy their most critical issue, according to the preliminary results of a nationwide CNN exit poll released on Tuesday afternoon.
The poll also showed that about one in five voters cited racial inequality as the most critical issue in choosing a presidential candidate, while about one in six voters saw the COVID-19 pandemic as being most important to their decision.
The United States has recorded more than 9.37 million confirmed COVID-19 cases and over 232,000 deaths as of Tuesday afternoon, according to the real-time count kept by Johns Hopkins University.
