Poll: Voters almost evenly divided on Trump’s Syria withdrawal

Voters are almost evenly split on President Trump’s withdrawal of U.S. troops from northern Syria, according to a Hill-HarrisX poll released on Thursday.

The survey showed that 33 percent of registered voters support the withdrawal, while 37 percent oppose it. Another 30 percent said that they were unsure about the move.

When broken down by party, more than half — 51 percent — of Republicans back Trump’s decision, compared to just 21 percent of Democrats and 27 percent of independents.

The opposite was true among Democrats, with 53 percent opposing the move. Thirty-eight percent of independents and 19 percent of Republicans were also against the withdrawal.

The survey comes as Trump faces pushback from both Democrats and Republicans alike over his decision to withdrawal U.S. troops from Syria earlier this month.

Lawmakers have said the pullback represents a betrayal of the Kurds, who are considered a key U.S. ally in the fight against ISIS.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. (R-Ky.) said Thursday that he was “encouraged” by a House resolution formally opposing Trump’s withdrawal, but he warned that it wasn’t enough.

“I believe it’s important that we make a strong forward-looking strategic statement. For that reason my preference would be for something even stronger than the resolution that the House passed yesterday, which has some serious weaknesses,” McConnell said from the Senate floor.

But Trump has repeatedly defended his decision, saying the U.S. cannot keep fighting “endless wars.”

The lack of U.S. military presence, meanwhile, has paved the way for a Turkish invasion into Syria, making Kurdish forces and civilians vulnerable. Ankara has long sought to launch an offensive against the Kurds, who it considers a domestic terrorist group.

The Hill-HarrisX poll was conducted among 1,001 registered voters. The margin of error for the full sampling is plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.

—Tess Bonn