Former President Donald Trump is boasting his largest lead yet in the latest Morning Consult survey analyzing the potential 2024 Republican primary field.
The survey, updated once weekly, found Trump’s lead jumping five percent over the last week. He now stands with 58 percent support in the potential 2024 Republican primary field, compared to the 53 percent he garnered last week.
While Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is maintaining his second place position, he lost support this week, moving from 24 percent support to 21 percent.
In other words, Trump now leads DeSantis by 37 percent — up from 29 percent last week. This breaks his previous lead record of 31 points mere weeks ago. At one point in early February, just 14 points separated the two.
No other potential candidate comes remotely close to Trump, as former Vice President Mike Pence comes in a distant third place with seven percent support — 51 points behind Trump and 14 points behind DeSantis. Every other individual listed has three percent support or less. Declared GOP candidates Nikki Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy have three percent support each, and former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson is at one percent support:
NEW: Tracking the 2024 GOP Primary:
Trump: 58%
DeSantis: 21%
Pence: 7%
Haley: 3%
Cheney: 3%
Ramaswamy: 3%
Abbott: 1%
Noem: 1%
Youngkin: 1%
Scott: 1%
Hutchinson: 1%
Someone Else: 1%
*April 21-23, 2023 https://t.co/4CBfh5gVos pic.twitter.com/3aOL3xGVkf— Morning Consult (@MorningConsult) April 25, 2023
As is consistent with past surveys, 47 percent of Trump supporters choose DeSantis as their second choice candidate, and 42 percent of DeSantis supporters choose Trump as their second choice candidate.
Further, the survey found Trump performing better than DeSantis in a head-to-head match with Biden — 42 percent to Biden’s 43 percent, which is within the survey’s margin of error. Biden leads DeSantis 44 percent to 40 percent.
Additionally, the survey found Republican voters most confident in Trump’s ability to defeat Biden, who announced his reelection campaign on Tuesday.
Per Morning Consult:
Trump Seen as More Electable than DeSantis: Despite a relatively poor record of electoral success during the past three election cycles, a majority of potential Republican primary voters (54%) say Trump has the best chance of beating Biden in the 2024 general election, compared with 1 in 4 who say DeSantis. College-educated primary voters are more likely than those without a degree to say that DeSantis has a better chance of beating Biden next year.
The survey was taken April 21-23, 2023, among 3,640 potential Republican primary voters. It has a +/- 2 percent margin of error. It comes as Trump increases attacks against DeSantis, sharing an ad on social media Monday night highlighting the governor’s previous support of Trump.
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