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Morning News

Gallup Poll: 60 Percent of Americans Approve of Decision to Retrieve Elian Gonzalez in Miami

Aired May 2, 2000 - 9:33 a.m. ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: More than a week after the controversial raid to reunite Elian with his father, polls continue to show public support for the motive, if not the method.

For the latest numbers, we turn to Gallup Poll editor-in-chief Frank Newport live again in Princeton.

Hey, Frank.

FRANK NEWPORT, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, GALLUP POLL: Good morning, Bill. In fact, you are right, we've had a week of extraordinary media of the raid in Miami, and yet public opinions remains about where it was when we did our first poll Saturday night last week, which was 60 percent roughly approve of the decision to go in and snatch Elian Gonzalez in Miami, return him to his father. And about, as you can see, a third, a little more than a third disapprove.

Our last poll, just this past weekend, the numbers were 60 to 36, really not much change overall.

Now, you are right about the methods. Even though, overall, the public approves of the decision on the part of the Justice Department to go after Elian Gonzalez, they don't approve on the methods, all those photos of the men with guns, of course, has had an impact, only 43 percent approve.

And the other issue was, of course, that if Elian Gonzalez goes back to Cuba he won't be as well off as he would be here in this country, and Americans actually agree with that.

We ask in this poll: Would Elian Gonzalez, if he goes back to Cuba, have a worse life or a better life than here? You can see the results. About 45 percent of Americans agree that the life in the communist Cuba would be worse for Elian Gonzalez than in the free democracy of America.

The point is, despite the methods in this issue, Americans still say, custody rules out, they approve of returning Elian Gonzalez to his father, and always feel that Elian should go back to Cuba.

One last point here, on the congressional hearing issue, this may die out. As you can, only about 43 percent of Americans overall approve of the issue of hearings. Even Republicans, and it's been Republican senators who are pushing it, nationally only about half of Republicans approve of the idea of having those hearings. We may not see them. We will have to watch politics and see what happens this week.

That's where the public stand on the Elian Gonzalez case, of this weekend, back to you.

HEMMER: OK, also something important to measure. Frank Newport, thank you.

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