Welcome to the second edition of “Polls in One Place.” The basic idea is this: There are dozens (and dozens) of polls published every week. “Polls in One Place” brings you what we think are the most interesting or important political polls of the week. We also include data that sort of jumps out at you.
“Polls in One Place” is compiled by Tom Smith, our political editor. Comments are mine, unless otherwise noted. If you come across a poll that you think other subscribers to Political Items would find interesting, please send it to Tom at: tecjsmith@gmail.com.
1. Nate Cohn:
(I)f the Republican Party isn’t quite a MAGA monolith, what is it? To better understand the party today, we split Republican and Republican-leaning voters into groups, based on the results of our Times/Siena poll. The groups were defined by how Republican-leaning voters felt on the issues — not how they felt about Mr. Trump.
The results depict a Republican coalition that consists of six groups:
The Moderate Establishment (14%). Highly educated, affluent, socially moderate or even liberal and often outright Never Trump.
The Traditional Conservatives (26%). Old-fashioned economic and social conservatives who oppose abortion and prefer corporate tax cuts to new tariffs. They don’t love Mr. Trump, but they do support him.
The Right Wing (26%). They watch Fox News and Newsmax. They’re “very conservative.” They’re disproportionately evangelical. They believe America is on the brink of catastrophe. And they love Mr. Trump more than any other group.
The Blue Collar Populists (12%). They’re mostly Northern, socially moderate, economic populists who hold deeply conservative views on race and immigration. Not only do they back Mr. Trump, but he himself probably counted as one a decade ago.
The Libertarian Conservatives (14%). These disproportionately Western and Midwestern conservatives value small government. They’re relatively socially moderate and isolationist, and they’re on the lower end of Trump support compared with other groups.
The Newcomers (8%). They don’t look like Republicans. They’re young, diverse and moderate. But these disaffected voters like Democrats and the “woke” left even less.
Mr. Trump’s dominance of the Republican Party is founded on an alliance between the Right Wing and Blue Collar Populists, two groups that combine to represent nearly 40 percent of Republicans — and about two-thirds of Mr. Trump’s MAGA base of seemingly unshakable support. (Source: nytimes.com)
2. GOP Horse Race, Part One:
After every new indictment, Donald Trump has boasted that his standing among Republicans only improves — and he has a point. Nearly two-thirds of Republicans — 63% — now say they want the former president to run again, according to new polling from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. That’s up slightly from the 55% who said the same in April when Trump began facing a series of criminal charges. Seven in 10 Republicans now have a favorable opinion of Trump, an uptick from the 60% who said so two months ago. But in a crucial warning sign for the former president and his supporters, Trump faces glaring vulnerabilities heading into a general election, with many Americans strongly dug in against him. While most Republicans — 74% — say they would support him in November 2024, 53% of Americans say they would definitely not support him if he is the nominee. Another 11% say they would probably not support him in November 2024. (Source: apnews.com)
3. GOP Horse Race, Part Two:
Former President Donald Trump maintains his large lead in the Republican presidential primary contest, as support doubles for Vivek Ramaswamy and Ron DeSantis hits a new low, according to a new Fox News national survey. Fifty-three percent of Republican primary voters prefer Trump, down a touch from 56% in June. That gives him a 37-point lead over DeSantis, who receives the backing of 16%. That’s down from 22% support in June and a high of 28% in February. (Source: foxnews.com)
Comment: We think Gov. DeSantis’s campaign is not as dire as these data might lead you to believe. The reason we think so is simple: DeSantis’s campaign is a two-state enterprise. If he does “better than expected” in Iowa and/or “better than expected” in New Hampshire, he has a path to the GOP’s presidential nomination. The others will drop out and he’ll be one-on-one with Mr. Trump, which is his only hope of defeating him. Sharing the not-Trump vote with other candidates equals defeat.
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