Exclusive: 20% of Americans support boycott of firms aligning themselves with Trump agenda

One in five Americans plan to turn their backs for good on companies that have shifted their policies to align with Donald Trump’s agenda, according to a new poll for the Guardian.

As high-profile brands including Amazon, Target and Tesla grapple with economic boycotts, research by the Harris Poll indicated the backlash could have a lasting impact.

“Companies and consumers are playing a high-stakes game of chicken – corporations betting on convenience winning out over conviction, while consumers wield their spending power like a weapon,” said Libby Rodney, chief strategy officer at the Harris Poll.

“The data suggests this is a miscalculation,” she said. “When 20% of Americans are permanently changing their consumption habits and nearly a third of boycotters say they’ll hold out indefinitely, convenience may no longer be the decisive factor companies think it is.”

When asked about the boycotts that have been making headlines over the last few weeks, 36% of Americans said they are or will be participating.

The strength of feeling varied significantly among people of different generations, races and political views:

• 53% of gen Zers and 46% of millennials said they are participating in boycotts, compared with 30% of gen Xers and just 22% of Boomers.

• Over half of Black (53%) and Hispanic (51%) Americans are boycotting, compared with 29% of white Americans.

• Democrats (49%) are far more likely to be boycotting now than independents (32%) and conservatives (29%).

When given a list of reasons why they are boycotting, Americans said the top reason was they want to show companies that consumers have economic power and influence (53%) and express their dissatisfaction with current government policies (49%).

Nearly half of those boycotting (46%) also pointed to companies rolling back their diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policies as a reason behind their boycott.

It’s difficult to track the tangible impacts boycotts have on companies and exactly how many people participate in them. Many start on social media, but other consumers have said they made the decision to move away from companies on their own.

Some groups have coordinated boycotts within their communities in recent weeks, particularly in response to companies like Target, Amazon and Walmart rolling back DEI measures. Target, for example, ended hiring goals for marginalized groups, while Walmart said it will no longer prioritize finding suppliers that are women- or minority-owned companies.

Some Americans feel companies are giving up core moral values in bowing to the president.

The Rev Jamal Bryant, a pastor based in Baltimore with a large social media following, called on his followers to give up spending money at Target for Lent, which started on 5 March and lasts until 17 April.

“These rollbacks represent more than just corporate decisions; they reflect a deeper erosion of the moral and ethical commitment necessary to build a just society,” Bryant wrote on the website he made for the boycott, targetfast.org. “This Lent, we will begin a corporate fast, starting with Target, as a spiritual act of resistance.”

Hispanic activists have similarly called on their community to boycott companies, calling it the Latino Freeze Movement. The movement calls for a boycott on companies that have scaled back their DEI initiatives, and asks for participants to not spend money on non-essentials “until they show us that they care about our minority and immigrant populations”.

Last month, a Harris poll found that 31% of Americans have reported similar goals to “opt out” of the economy this year in light of the changing political climate.

The companies have said that they are responding to a changing legal environment around DEI. DEI has been a flashpoint in the culture wars for years, with conservatives arguing that it unfairly discriminates against groups that have historically been in the majority, like white Americans.

On the campaign trail, Trump vowed to abolish DEI, and he signed multiple executive orders ending DEI programs within the federal government as soon as he came into office. The impact that the administration can have on efforts in the private sector is still unclear, but some companies appear willing to risk losing customers instead of taking their chances.