No, '60% of Republicans' Are Not Unvaccinated

UPDATE:

Ian Bremmer added more tweets to the original, acknowledging eight hours after the fact that there was an "important typo." He also claimed that his "Key point still remains."

(thanks for those pointing out, important typo)

— ian bremmer (@ianbremmer) December 30, 2021

ORIGINAL POST:

On Thursday, Twitter had "60% of Republicans" trending, noting that "Data from the Kaiser Family Foundation found that out of those who remained unvaccinated against COVID-19 in October, 60% were Republicans and 17% were Democrats." 

pic.twitter.com/eWLIQCBwym

— Rebecca Downs (@RebeccaRoseGold) December 30, 2021

The trend was largely due to a tweet from Ian Bremmer, a political scientist and president and founder of the Eurasia Group. His tweet appears to suggest that 60 percent of Republicans are unvaccinated, which he does not cite. Bremmer, with almost 593,000 followers on Twitter, has quite the platform. 

A number of tweets mentioning "60% of Republicans" do indeed believe that 60 percent of Republicans are unvaccinated. 

That’s not how the math works… it is 60% of unvaccinated people are republicans. NOT 60% of republicans are unvaccinated. It’s still a very telling statistic but accuracy matters.

— Carolyn H (@heart_stamper) December 30, 2021

60% of Republicans are unvaccinated, which means they may soon meet Herman Cain.

— Avenger Resister (@AvengerResister) December 30, 2021

60% of Republicans are #COVIDIOTS and I don't care...the less of them around, the better it will be for Americans. pic.twitter.com/lDFxIJQbQg

— Vaxxed & Masked REAL #American (@1DESTROYTHEGOP) December 30, 2021

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60% of Republicans are unvaccinated and to blame for the surge, not Joe Biden.

— Kelly ??? (@kellwoohoo) December 30, 2021

In reality, according to October data from the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF), among those who were unvaccinated, 60 percent identified as Republican. The data was published in November. 

When it comes to the percentage of Republicans who have been vaccinated, it is indeed more than 40 percent. According to September data from KFF, 58 percent of Republicans have been vaccinated. A Gallup poll, also from September, similarly found that 56 percent of Republicans have been vaccinated. 

Data released in October from KFF completely turns Bremmer's tweet on its head, as it shows that 61 percent of Republicans were vaccinated. 

Our friends at Twitchy highlighted that Bremmer is taking heat from both sides for such a misleading tweet, including those who did provide sources. 

This is completely false — total misreading of the data. Bremmer seems to be referencing a poll from October which suggested that 60% of unvaccinated people are Republican leaning while 17% of unvaccinated people are Democrat leaning, NOT that 60% of Republicans are unvaccinated. https://t.co/S4457Ni3Z1

— Jerry Christmas ?????? (@JerryDunleavy) December 30, 2021

Polling is a really flawed way to measure vaccination rates, but this isn’t even an accurate post about the poll.

It’s 60% of unvaccinated were R’s or R leaning Indies, not 60% of Republicans are unvaccinated. Overwhelming majority of Republicans and Democrats are vaccinated. https://t.co/NHUeaCZmSD pic.twitter.com/1PSmgt6v4k

— AG (@AGHamilton29) December 30, 2021

This viral tweet is false. Appears to be a reference to KFF data from October, but what KFF found was that 60% of unvaccinated adults are Republicans (or Republican-leaning independents), not that 60% of Republicans are unvaccinated. https://t.co/vBwnKUdCK4 https://t.co/54cVMyfWfc

— Josh Barro (@jbarro) December 30, 2021

You appear to have misread the article linked below. 60% of the unvaccinated are Republicans. 17% are Democrats. https://t.co/gRMMoWPieO

— Matthew Sheffield (@mattsheffield) December 30, 2021

Pollster Frank Luntz pointed out that Bremmer had plenty of character space to communicate the truth about what he was tweeting about. 

Why don’t you ever post your sources?

You have plenty of character space in your tweet.

— Frank Luntz (@FrankLuntz) December 30, 2021

While we have the receipts of Bremmer's tweet, seven hours later it's still up. He has since tweeted plenty but has yet to address this specific tweet and its misleading message.