Exclusive: 5 ways AI is winning over the skeptics
Add Axios as your preferred source to
see more of our stories on Google.
Illustration: Natalie Peeples/Axios
A handful of specific AI use cases highlight an opportunity for the technology to overcome some of America's widespread skepticism and win broader trust, according to a new Morning Consult poll shared exclusively with Axios.
The big picture: Practical applications that keep people alive, safe and protected from scams could prompt skeptics to reconsider their attitudes.
Americans appear to trust AI more when they see how it can help people in specific urgent situations.
- Trust in the technology jumped 14 percentage points — from 41% to 55% — after observing the following use cases:
- 🪖 Helping others: A Veterans Affairs tool flagged more than 130,000 at-risk veterans and helped connect them to care. (Trust bump: 56%)
- 💳 Fraud detection: An AI fraud-detection system flagged suspicious transactions quickly before any money was removed from an account. (56% bump)
- 💊 Cancer discovery: A Mayo Clinic AI tool spotted pancreatic cancer on CT scans up to three years before any diagnosis. (55% bump)
- 🌪️ Disaster relief: A tool called "GraphCast" was used to show how early warnings for hurricanes, floods and extreme heat can be detected. (55% bump)
- 🚒 Curbing fatal illness: An AI system at Johns Hopkins cut sepsis deaths by about 20% by flagging warning signs hours in advance. (54% bump)
Between the lines: The poll, which surveyed 1,522 U.S. adults, showed respondents 65 positive examples of AI being used in the real world to see what made people trust AI "a lot" or "somewhat" more.
Zoom out: Americans remain deeply skeptical of AI as fears about its risks become national flashpoints.
- An Economist/YouGov poll from late July found 72% of Americans don't trust AI to make ethical decisions.
- The data centers that power AI are wildly unpopular.
Yes, but: American still use AI in spades and shows few signs of going away.
- The Morning Consult poll found that more than half of Americans use AI monthly, with 19% using it multiple times a day. Only 28% say they never use it at all.
The fine print: Morning Consult surveyed 1,522 U.S. adults from Sept. 15 to 16, 2026. Respondents reviewed 65 real-world examples of AI in use across areas including medicine, fraud prevention and disaster response. The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
