Reading Time: < 1 minute

Wisconsin Watch partners with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. Read our methodology to learn how we check claims.

Yes.

A national poll released by Marquette University Law School in Milwaukee found half of Republican respondents believed former President Donald Trump had classified materials at his Florida estate and the other half did not.

The poll asked: “Do you believe Donald Trump had top secret and other classified material or national security documents at his home in Mar-a-Lago last year?”

Among Republican respondents, 49% said yes and 50% said no. Among Democrats, 95% said yes and 5% said no. Among independents, 78% said yes and 19% said no.

The survey was done July 7-12 among 1,005 U.S. adults. The margin of error was +/-5.8 percentage points for registered Republican voters and +/-6.7 percentage points for registered Democratic voters.

A Miami grand jury indicted Trump June 8 on charges including corruptly concealing a document or record and willful retention of national defense information.

Marquette’s September survey found 40% of Republicans thought Trump held on to classified documents and 60% did not.

Sources

Marquette New Marquette Law School national survey finds Trump holding steady among Republicans, DeSantis remaining clear second choice in party, and a tie in Biden/Trump head-to-head

Marquette Marquette Law School Poll Methodology Statement

This Fact Brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.

Creative Commons License

Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.

Tom Kertscher joined as a Wisconsin Watch fact checker in January 2023 and contributes to our collaboration with the The Gigafact Project to fight misinformation online. Kertscher is a former longtime newspaper reporter, including at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, who has worked as a self-employed journalist since 2019. His gigs include contributing writer for PolitiFact and sports freelancer for The Associated Press.