Mitch Perry
For the second time in the past week, a New Hampshire presidential poll shows Marco Rubio ascending in support there, and Jeb Bush dropping back.
The new Bloomberg Politics/Saint Anselm New Hampshire Poll released on Sunday shows four Republicans in a virtual tie at the front – Rand Paul and Scott Walker get 12 percent support, with Bush and Rubio right behind at 11 percent.
But as was the case in a WMUR poll conducted and published a few days ago, it’s Rubio who appears to be gaining momentum in the Granite State, which will host the first presidential primary election sometime early next year. The Florida Senator more than doubled his level of primary support since the last time Bloomberg polled back in February. Rubio announced his candidacy for president on April 13.
Jeb Bush, on the other hand, dropped five percentage points since February, his lowest level of support since the poll started tracking the state’s voters in November. The pollsters say that Bush’s support among independents in New Hampshire is weak, as he is gathering only 6 percent support from indies.
Rubio, Bush and Rand Paul are also faring better against potential Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton in one-on-one matches now than in February.
Clinton has a slight 44-42 percentage point lead over both Bush and Rubio in New Hampshire today, according to the poll. She leads Rand Paul by a 46-43 percent margin, and Scott Walker, 46-40 percent.
Clinton is the first choice of 62 percent of likely Democratic primary voters, again showing that a series of negative news reporters hasn’t hurt her very much amongst the base. Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders is next at 18 percent.
The poll, conducted by Purple Strategies, included 500 general-election voters as well as over-samples to have 400 Republican primary voters and 400 Democratic primary voters. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.4 percentage points on general-election questions and plus or minus 4.9 percentage points on primary election questions.
