Americans can't agree on what socialism is but 20% still see it as a threat to the US

Nearly 21% of Americans consider socialism to be a threat to the US, according to INSIDER polling, even though they tend to disagree on what “socialism” actually is.

Just 5% of poll respondents said they “consider myself a socialist,” but nearly 28% said they “support some policies that could be considered socialist even if I don't agree entirely.”

In general, the poll found vastly diverging views among Americans on what socialism is, based on whether people identify themselves as socialists or consider it to be a threat.

The poll also found almost 20% of likely Democratic primary voters are uncomfortable with socialism on some level.

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Americans can't agree on what exactly socialism is, but that hasn't stopped roughly 20% from viewing it as a threat to the US, according to INSIDER polling.

Prominent figures like presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez identify as democratic socialists and Republicans are using calls of “socialism” to try to attack Democrats, a label that even came up at the first round of Democratic primary debates.

INSIDER asked poll respondents to point to one of six statements that best describes their view of socialism.

Just 5% answered they “consider myself a socialist,” but nearly 28% said they “support some policies that could be considered socialist even if I don't agree entirely.”

Meanwhile, about 15% said they “generally disagree with policies that I'd describe as socialist” while nearly 21% said they “consider socialism a threat to the US.”

The poll found almost 13% of Americans “don't feel strongly about socialism” and about 18% said “I don't know” when asked to point to the statement that best describes their view.

INSIDER also asked poll respondents to point to policies or aspects of government they consider “socialism,” including: the elimination of private property, a collectivized economy, public ownership of corporations, federal administration of health care, a public option for health insurance in an otherwise free market, free or subsidized community college, Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid, public utilities, unions, state administration of natural resources, the Green New Deal, law enforcement, and roads.

In general, the poll found vastly different views among Americans on what socialism is based on whether people consider themselves to be socialist or consider it to be a threat.

Read more: Here's the difference between a 'socialist' and a 'Democratic socialist'

The poll, for example, found that while nearly 80% of those who view socialism as a threat see the elimination of private property as socialism, just 23% of people who consider themselves to be socialist feel the same way.

Moreover, the polling showed people who view socialism as a threat also don't tend to perceive Social Security and Medicare as socialist, but they do tend to consider the federal administration of healthcare and the Green New Deal to be socialist.

The poll did find some agreement on what policies should be considered socialism, however. Nearly 68% of those who consider themselves to be socialist and 54% of those who view socialism as a threat identified free or subsidized community college as “socialism.”

Almost 20% of likely Democratic primary voters are wary of socialism

When broken down by political party affiliation, things also get interesting. More than half of people who said they would likely vote in their state's Democratic primary or caucus said they were cool with socialism to some degree: 9% said “I consider myself to be socialist” while nearly 44% said they “support some policies that could be considered socialist even if I don't agree entirely.”

At the same time, about 6% of likely Democratic primary voters said they view socialism as a threat to the US and about 13% said they generally disagree with policies they'd describe as socialist. Taken together, this means almost 20% of likely Democratic primary voters are uncomfortable with socialism on some level.

Read more: Trump's latest line of attack against 2020 Democrats is to tie them to socialism

Comparatively, of the respondents that said they were likely to vote in their state's Republican caucus or primary less than 3% said they consider themselves to be socialist and about 51% said they consider socialism to be a threat to the US.

President Donald Trump and his 2020 re-election campaign have sought to tie Democrats to socialism as a means of discrediting the candidates along the campaign trail, with particular focus on self-declared democratic socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont.

Based on INSIDER's data, this is a potentially potent strategy, given the significant number of likely Democratic primary voters who are uncomfortable with socialism on top of the big chunk of Americans who view it as an existential threat.