White and black Americans have long reacted in sharply different ways to police-related deaths of black men and ensuing protests. But now whites have joined African Americans in saying U.S. race relations are in dire straits.

Fully 62 percent of whites say race relations are “generally bad” according to a New York Times/CBS News poll released Monday, rising a striking 27 percentage points since February. Fifty six percent of whites said race relations were generally good in February, only months after protests of police actions from Ferguson, Mo. to Staten Island, N.Y.

In the new poll, whites' concern over race relations is the highest in over 20 years of NYT/CBS polls, and the highest since reactions to riots following the acquittal of the police officers involved in the beating of Rodney King in 1992.



New York Times/CBS News poll. Graphic: New York Times.

African Americans have consistently been more downbeat about the state of race relations; 65 percent of blacks say race relations are bad in the new poll, ticking up from 58 percent in February.

The results mark a shrinking racial chasm in reactions to police-related deaths of black men after the shooting of Walter Scott in North Charleston and death of Freddie Gray in Baltimore. Large majorities of whites and blacks said it was the “right decision” to charge officers in Gray’s death, according to a Pew Research Center poll released Monday. And there's been consistent agreement across racial groups on requiring police to wear body cameras; 93 percent of African Americans and whites in the CBS/NYT poll support officers wearing cameras while on duty.

While racial divisions are shrinking in some areas, divisions on other core issues have persisted, as Aaron Blake wrote this morning. The NYT/CBS poll shows little change in white views of racial bias in policing – 55 percent of whites say most police are no more likely to use force against a black person than a white person, compared with 59 percent who said this in February. By contrast, 79 percent of African Americans say police are more likely to use force against blacks.

Those more stubborn differences could bear heavily on the impetus for reforms in policing, as well as reactions to less clear-cut controversies in police using force going forward.

Peyton M. Craighill contributed to this report.