• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, March 28, 2024

You read that right. In a presidential election year first, the economy is not the No. 1 issue among American voters. The threat to democracy is, according to first-of-its-kind data from Ipsos' political tracking team.

To be fair, Ipsos never asked about the threat "political extremism" poses for democracy before, though Ipsos pollster and opinion researcher Chris Jackson told those attending this month's 2024 election briefing today "it's something we should have been measuring."

But effective with a March 2024 benchmark, "political extremism or threats to democracy" ranks as the No. 1 issue, four percentage points ahead of the No. 2 issue, the economy.

Not surprisingly given all of the media focus and Republican spin on the border "crisis," immigration has soared to a close No. 3, just behind the economy, while all other issues remain also rans -- though abortion issues are ascending. (See below.)

Interestingly, the age of the candidates doesn't even show up among the top issues of American voters, though the media continue to harp on that, especially related to President Joe Biden.

And while Biden continues to be under water in national polling -- with more Americans feeling he's doing a poor job than a good job -- Jackson noted that Biden has picked up couple of points recently and is likely to pick up at least five more leading up to the election. That would move him from a "coin flip" to marginal incumbent advantage, according to Jackson, though Trump currently is more favored.

The Ipsos team drilled down into some partisan perspectives on the No. issue -- political extremism and threats to democracy -- and not surprisingly, they have a partisan split in terms of which side is to blame.

"It depends exactly on how the question is asked, you see different results," Jackson noted, adding that when Ipsos matches up the two candidates on which is better at protecting democracy, "Biden scores higher than Trump by seven or eight percentage points."