Google Trends reports that 50 percent of candidate searches are for the Democrat, with 44 percent for the Republican. Libertarian candidate Jo Jorgensen is the subject of 5 percent of searches and the 1 percent were for the Green Party’s Howie Hawkins.
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton never ranked higher than Trump in Google searches during 2016 after Trump became the Republican Party’s nominee . Trump led searches in 38 states on the eve of the 2016 Election Day.
Trump accounted for 55 percent of Google searches between November 2016 and that year’s Election Day, according to Google Trends.
Google notes, searches indicate curiosity about a candidate and “It should not be considered an indication of voter intent.”
Searches for Biden have seen spikes over the past month, including a rise between October 18 and 24, with the crucial swing state of Pennsylvania one of the top five regions googling “Biden.”
By contrast, searches for “Trump” saw a sharp decline in October and of the top five states googling the term, none are considered likely 2020 swing states by pollsters.
Voters have also been searching election issues. Unemployment was the most googled issue in the past seven days in almost every region of country, followed by crime, wages, healthcare and the Supreme Court.
The unemployment rate stands at 7.9 percent with 12.6 million Americans out of work. The COVID-19 pandemic has contributed to record levels of unemployment and an economic contraction.
Google Trends data also showed that searches like “How to vote” spiked 1,000 percent (ten-fold) shortly before election, “Where do I vote” by 1,400 percent and “What time do polls open on Election Day?” by 700 percent.
The top election-related questions over the past day were “When is Election Day?”, “Is Election Day a federal holiday?” and “What is Election Day?”, Google Trends noted on Twitter.
In July, Google accounted for 62 percent of desktop searches in the U.S., according to Statista, and had a 93 percent market share among mobile search providers.
