Trump has been convicted — but that may not weigh down his White House bid. Here's why

• It's not clear what impact the criminal conviction of Donald Trump will have on his presidential campaign against President Joe Biden.
• Recent polls show only a small fraction of non-Democratic voters would be less likely to vote for Trump over a guilty verdict in his hush money trial.
• But in a consistently tight race with two well-known candidates targeting a small-but-important slice of swing voters, any shift in opinion resulting from the guilty verdict could have an outsize effect.

Donald Trump is now the first former American president ever to be convicted in a criminal trial — but it's far from clear whether that black mark will sink, or even weigh down, his bid to unseat President Joe Biden.

Recent polls suggest that the guilty verdict could affect how key voting blocs view Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee.

But any change may not be enough to change the trajectory of the presidential race, according to the latest poll finding that only a small fraction of non-Democratic voters would be less likely to vote for Trump if he is found guilty in the hush money trial.

Nearly three-fourths of registered independents said that a guilty verdict against Trump would make no difference to their vote, according to the survey from NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist released Thursday morning.

Just 11% of those respondents said that outcome would make them less likely to back Trump in November, while 15% of the group said a guilty verdict would more them more likely to support him.

Among Republicans, 25% said they will be more inclined to vote for Trump if he is found guilty in New York, versus 10% who say they will be less likely to do so.

Those answers echo the results of a recent Quinnipiac University poll, in which