Republican presidential frontrunner Donald Trump recently stirred up some controversy when he expressed support for proposals for the government to monitor Muslims in the United States, in light of the terror attacks being launched by extremist Muslims around the world.
It turns out Trump is not alone in espousing this idea. In fact, a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey revealed that more and more Americans are becoming receptive to the idea of tracking down certain Muslims on American soil, as part of efforts to thwart terrorist activities in the U.S.
The poll results showed that 32 percent of likely U.S. voters believe most individual Muslims should be monitored by the government as potential terrorists, according to an article posted on the Rasmussen Reports website.
This percentage, although still a minority compared to the 52 percent who are opposed to the plan to monitor Muslims, is higher by 10 percent from survey results released in July 2013, or right after the Boston Marathon bombings.
When analysed based on party lines, Republican respondents were found to be more receptive to the idea of the government tracking down Muslims in the U.S.
A total of 43 percent of the Republican respondents said they were in favour of near-blanket surveillance of Muslims—significantly higher than the 24 percent of Democrats and 29 percent of independent voters who expressed support for the idea.
Self-confessed political conservatives, meanwhile, were also found to be more supportive of the idea of government monitoring on most Muslims, with 45 percent agreeing to the proposal.
Only 30 percent of moderates agreed to the idea of government surveillance on Muslims, while only 10 percent of liberals were keen on supporting that view.
Furthermore, nearly 2 out of 5 (38 percent) of those who described radical Islamic terrorism as a "very serious" threat to the United States were willing to support monitoring most Muslims as potential terrorists.
The same Rasmussen Reports survey also showed that almost half of the U.S. population is dissatisfied with how the government is handling the threat of terrorism in the country.
"Even prior to the recent killings in Paris by radical Islamic terrorists, 49 percent of all voters felt the federal government is not devoting attention to the potential threat of domestic Islamic terrorism," the pollster noted, as quoted by Newsmax.
