Phil Ammann
With businessman Donald Trump entering the race for the GOP presidential nomination, a new Fox News poll found a shift in the leader board, with both Trump and Jeb Bush receiving bumps after their formal announcements.
On the list of Republican contenders, Bush leads with his best showing yet, getting 15 percent support among primary voters. That’s a jump from 12 percent in May. Bush launched his campaign June 15.
Since announcing on June 16 – one day after Bush — Trump’s support has more than doubled, now at 11 percent and putting him in the top-tier. The only other candidate with double-digit backing, the survey shows, is neurosurgeon Ben Carson with 10 percent.
As for the Democrats, the survey has former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton remaining the clear front-runner.
But it is not all good news for Trump; only 29 percent of Republican primary voters see him as a serious candidate. Nearly two-thirds of respondents (64 percent) think his campaign is a distraction.
And nearly 8 in 10 of all voters (77 percent) believe Trump is a “sideshow.”
Although he has not officially entered the race, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker receives 9 percent support, down from 12 percent last month. It’s the only time since January that Walker has dipped into the single digits.
Of the others in the growing GOP field, it’s Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul (9 percent), Marco Rubio (8 percent) and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee (6 percent) holding steady among GOP primary voters.
Down the list are Texas Sen. Ted Cruz with 4 percent, and former Hewitt Packard CEO Carly Fiorina and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum with 3 percent each.
Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal gets 2 percent; he announced his bid on Wednesday.
On the Democratic side, polling found Clinton firmly in command with 61 percent of Democratic voters; Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders is second, receiving 15 percent. Another 11 percent support Vice President Joe Biden; New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo got 3 percent – neither one has declared.
According to Fox News, Trump and Clinton share one thing in common: a lack of trust by voters.
Trump is well under water on the subject of honesty, by negative 34 points: 64 percent say he is untrustworthy compared with 30 percent who say he is. Clinton’s score is only at a negative 7: 45 percent to 52 percent.
Bush’s honesty score is also negative, by just 2 points: 45 percent honest compared to 47 percent not. In April, the needle was at 46 percent honest and 42 percent dishonest. Rubio is at a positive 4-point honesty rating, although nearly one-third of voters did not know enough to rate him. Yet, a majority of Republicans (57 percent) say the U.S. senator is honest.
In head-to-head match-ups, Clinton leads every GOP candidate polled except Bush. The two tied with 43 percent each, after Bush getting a 1-point advantage in May and tying with Clinton in March.
Clinton also leads Rubio by a single point, Paul by 4 points, and Carson by 5 points. The former first lady beats Cruz, Fiorina and Walker by 6 points apiece. All of these hypothetical match-ups are within the poll’s margin of error.
Despite Trump’s addition to the top-tier of the GOP field, Clinton performs her best against him, by 17 points.
Clinton may have the advantage, but Republicans still like their 2016 chances if she’s the Democratic nominee: 22 percent say there is an “excellent” chance, while 58 percent say the GOP has a “good” chance.
Many Democrats polled have doubts about Clinton, as well: 46 percent say the GOP has a chance of beating her; 49 percent do not.
With independents polled, they say Republicans have a good chance of victory in 2016 against Clinton, 67 percent to 28 percent.
Fox News surveyed 1,005 registered voters nationwide, randomly choosing respondents through both landline and cell phone interviews from June 21-23. The margin of error for the full poll is +/- three percentage points. Within subgroups of Democratic and Republican primary voters, the margin of error was slightly higher (+/-5 percent).
