Americans have grown increasingly wary of ISIS over the past six months, but their confidence in the U.S.’ ability to combat the extremist group is waning, according to a new CNN/ORC poll.
The poll finds fully 80% of Americans say ISIS poses a serious threat to the United States —Â a steady increase from September, when 63% said the same.
Only 6% of respondents in the new poll say ISIS isn’t a serious threat. A large majority (56%) characterize the group as a “very serious” threat to the U.S., while one-quarter say the threat posed by ISIS is “fairly serious,” and 14% say it’s “somewhat serious.”
The growing unease with the terrorist group comes as it’s increasingly drawn headlines for brutal attacks across the globe, most recently in Tunisia, where ISIS is claiming responsibility for an attack on a museum that left 22 dead.
And now, 79% of Americans are very or somewhat worried that the fight against ISIS will will balloon into a war that could expand across the region, up from 65% that felt the same in September.
But as concerns over ISIS have grown, it seems Americans’ confidence in the plan to combat the terrorist organization has declined. Now, 56% of Americans expressed some level of confidence that the military’s strategy to defeat ISIS will succeed; in September, the number expressing confidence was 61%.
Still, 43% of respondents in the latest poll say they’re not too confident, or not confident at all, that the U.S. effort against ISIS will be successful.
The CNN/ORC survey was conducted via telephone from March 13-15 among 1,009 adult Americans, and has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
