Four times as many Britons would back the Democrats than the Republicans
Key takeaways
- Britons are roughly four times as likely to say they would support the Democrats (42%) than the Republicans (10%), if they were in the US
- Reform voters are the only major political or demographic group to favour the Republicans over the Democrats
- 41% of Britons say they expect the results of the midterms to have at least a fair amount of impact on the UK
- Donald Trump's latest net favourability score in Britain of –76 is a new low, with 86% having a negative view of him and only 10% a positive one
- Most Britons likewise now have a negative opinion of the US, with 61% saying so
Voting is underway in the US midterm elections, which YouGov America’s polling suggests could dramatically tip the balance of power in Congress, with the Democrats leading in key Senate races and having a 98% chance of winning a majority in the House of Representatives according to our model. This follows Donald Trump’s personal ratings falling to historic lows in recent months.
While the most immediate impact of the results will, of course, be felt in America, they also have the potential to change the course of events around the world, from Iran to Ukraine, and maybe Britain too?
Indeed, 41% of Britons believe that the results of the midterms will have an at least fair amount of impact on life in the UK, though they are near matched by 36% who expect the vote will have little to no impact on Britain.
Which American party would Britons support?
Regardless of the eventual impact on the UK, Britons obviously do not have a vote in this contest. Nonetheless, they do have a clear preference for one party over the other.
Around four in ten Britons (42%) say they would likely support the Democratic Party if they were in the US, relative to a mere 10% saying they think they would vote Republican if they were able to. A further 17% say they would back neither party if they were stateside, while 31% are unsure which of the two they would favour.
This is a similar ratio to support for the parties’ candidates in the last presidential election, when Britons would rather Kamala Harris had won by 64% to 18%.
A preference for the Democrats over the Republicans extends across pretty much every major political and demographic divide in Britain, with one exception: Reform voters, who are three times as likely to favour the Republicans (36%) than the Democrats (12%).
This contrasts with nearly two thirds of Labour, Lib Dem and Green voters (63-64%) saying they would be more likely to support the Democrats, and only negligible proportions (2-3%) preferring the Republicans. Those who voted Conservative in 2024 are also more likely to favour America’s ‘liberal’ party (32%) than its ostensibly ‘conservative’ one (14%), though with 54% saying ‘neither’ or ‘don’t know’.
Donald Trump is highly unpopular in Britain, and has made the US unpopular as well
With the midterm elections taking place against the backdrop of record levels of unpopularity for Donald Trump, YouGov UK's tracker data shows that the US president has similarly reached his most negative rating among the British public as well.
Our latest tracker data from October shows that 86% of Britons have an unfavourable view of the US president, compared to only 10% who see him in favourable terms. These represent the joint-highest unfavourable and joint-lowest favourable figures we have recorded since we started tracking in March 2025, but the first time they have coincided in the same month, making Trump's net favourability score of -76 the lowest to date.
Even among Reform voters, who are the warmest group towards Trump, only 36% have a favourable view of the president, with 61% holding a negative opinion. This compares to 85-97% of Labour, Conservative, Lib Dem and Green voters.
Likewise, most Britons now have a negative opinion of the United States itself. As of our most recent survey in August, six in ten (61%) are unfavourable towards the country, almost twice the number who continue to have a positive view of the US (31%).
In fact, these most recent figures are the most unpopular the US has been in Britain since YouGov started tracking in November 2016. Even in Trump's first term of office the US had consistently been more popular than unpopular among the British public, with the exception of two waves towards the end of his first stint in the White House.
With the country's reputation having reverted to previous form during Joe Biden's time as president, it has since been negative for the entire period of Donald Trump's second term of office, particularly following Trump's threats against Greenland at the beginning of the year.
Reform voters are the only group to have a positive view of the US overall, with 62% saying so – although only 17% have a “very favourable” opinion of the country. Tories are divided, with 49% favourable versus 47% unfavourable, while only small numbers of Labour (19%), Lib Dem (20%) and Green voters (11%) today have a positive view of the US.
See the full results here
Methodology
- Sample size: An online survey of 2,355 adults aged 18+ living in Great Britain
- Fieldwork: 1 to 2 November 2026
- Commissioned by: YouGov
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