Voters say nuclear weapons threat an important issue for presidential candidates to address

Eight in 10 voters say it is essential or very important for presidential candidates to have clear plans and policies concerning the threat of nuclear weapons, according to an analysis by Hart Research Associates.

The majority of voters said they would have a more favorable opinion of a candidate who puts a high priority on reducing the threats posed by nuclear weapons. When broken by party, this was the opinion of 87 percent of Democrats, 81 percent of Republicans, and 71 percent of independents.

“In our highly polarized political environment, it can be difficult to find areas of agreement between Republicans and Democrats, but this survey identifies nuclear weapons threats to be one such area,” Hart Research Associates said in a statement.

The issues that interested voters the most were preventing terrorists from obtaining nuclear weapons, preventing the use of nuclear weapons, preventing Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, convincing North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons, and making progress for eliminating all nuclear weapons.

The survey was conducted for the Nuclear Threat Initiative over nine days in November.

Hart interviewed 800 registered voters in Arizona, California, Colorado, Georgia, Iowa, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, Nevada, South Carolina, Texas, and Virginia.