It's the eve of the Brexit referendum, when British voters decide whether they will exit or stay in the European Union. A poll shows that 80% of Americans favor Britain leaving the E.U., and that they support the departure more than any other country -- including the U.K.
The data comes from polls posted through May and June in 123 articles on the website of The Independent, a liberal British newspaper with a global online readership. Polling and quiz company Apester powered the polls and analyzed votes from 359,217 users. The polls asked just one question: should Britain leave the European Union or remain a part of it? 51 percent of all voters voted to remain.
Just under 30,000 of those voters were in the U.S., and 80 percent voted to leave. That's 22,852 votes. The results are at odds with the government's official stance on Brexit -- President Obama urged Britons to vote to remain in April.
American readers of The Independent were more pro-Brexit than readers from any other country, including the U.K. itself. 53% of the 250,000 British readers surveyed voted to remain, which conforms to polls of the general population showing a near tie, as of Wednesday. If you look at the table below, you'll notice that voters from European countries all support remaining.
Apester
New Zealand, Australia and Canada all voted to leave, but by a lower margin between 54 and 62 percent. It's worth noting that these countries are former colonies of the United Kingdom, and that they remain members of the Commonwealth following peaceful transitions to independence.
"These results are fascinating because the outcome is so spookily evenly balanced," wrote The Independent's chief political commentator. "It's not a representative survey but it's interesting that Independent readers are so Independent."
