33 Percent of Republican Primary Voters Support Trump
Growing Acceptance of Trump’s Candidacy: 23 Percent Support in March, Now 65 Percent
JAN. 14, 2016 – Republican presidential frontrunner Donald Trump has now more than doubled his national lead in the Republican presidential race ahead of tonight’s debate, according to numbers from a new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.
33 percent of national Republican primary voters support Trump, followed by 20 percent for Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and 13 percent for Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.). Trump’s 13-point lead is an increase from his 5-point lead over Sen. Cruz last month.
The poll also reveals a growing acceptance of Trump as a candidate: in March, only 23 percent of Republican primary voters said they could support him. That number is now 65 percent.
Full poll analysis is included below and available here: http://nbcnews.to/1Q1aMzj.
MANDATORY CREDIT: NBC NEWS/WALL STREET JOURNAL
The NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll was conducted from January 9-13, 2016. The margin of error for the responses among the 400 Republican primary voters is plus-minus 4.9 percentage points.
# # #
Trump More Than Doubles National Lead in NBC News/WSJ Poll
By Mark Murray (@mmurraypolitics)
CHARLESTON, S.C. — Donald Trump has more than doubled his national lead in the Republican presidential race ahead of Thursday night’s GOP debate here, according to the results from a new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.
Trump is the first choice of 33 percent of national Republican primary voters – his highest percentage in the poll. He’s followed by Ted Cruz at 20 percent, Marco Rubio at 13 percent and Ben Carson at 12 percent. Chris Christie and Jeb Bush are tied at 5 percent. No other Republican presidential candidate gets more than 3 percent.
Trump’s 13-point lead over Cruz is an increase from last month, when he held a five-point advantage over the Texas senator, 27 percent to 22 percent.
Yet in a hypothetical one-on-one race between the two Republicans, Cruz tops Trump, 51 percent to 43 percent, while Trump beats Rubio in their one-on-one matchup, 52 percent to 45 percent.
In a three-way contest featuring the Top 3 Republicans in the poll, Trump gets 40 percent, Cruz 31 percent and Rubio 26 percent, underscoring the overall strengthen out of the outsider/insurgent wing of the Republican Party.
Maybe the most striking finding in this NBC/WSJ poll is the growing GOP acceptance of Trump. Back in March, only 23 percent of Republican primary voters said they could see themselves supporting the real-estate mogul. Now that number stands at 65 percent.
The Republican candidates with the highest percentages on this question are Cruz (at 71 percent, up from 40 percent in March) and Rubio (at 67 percent, up from 56 percent 10 months ago).
By contrast, only 42 percent of Republicans say that they can see themselves supporting Jeb Bush, which is down from 75 percent in June.
Sixty percent of GOP primary voters say they can see themselves backing Carson – down from 77 percent in the late Oct. 2015 NBC/WSJ poll, when he was leading the Republican field.
The NBC News/WSJ poll was conducted by Public Opinion Strategies (a Republican polling firm) and Hart Research Associates (a Democratic firm) from Jan. 9-13. The margin of error for the responses among the 400 Republican primary voters is plus-minus 4.9 percentage points.
# # #
For more information, please contact:
Olivia Petersen
NBC News
202-885-4159
ABOUT NBC NEWS
NBC News is a global leader in news across all broadcast and digital platforms. Its leading and award-winning television news broadcasts include NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt, TODAY, Meet the Press and Dateline, as well as primetime specials and breaking news reports. The rapidly-growing NBC News Digital Group, along with the well-established NBC News Radio with 750 stations nationwide, provide continuous content to consumers wherever they are, whenever they want it. NBC News also operates Peacock Productions, an award-winning in-house production company, and the NBC NewsChannel affiliate news service. NBC News is part of the NBCUniversal News Group, a division of NBCUniversal, which is owned by Comcast Corporation.
NBC News is a division of NBCUniversal, one of the world’s leading media and entertainment companies. For more corporate information, visit www.nbcuniversal.com.
# # #
