The race for the 2024 presidential election continues to intensify and could see an exciting head-to-head battle for the Republican nomination. Here’s the latest poll data.
Former President Donald Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis are the two leading candidates for the 2024 Republican presidential primary. While DeSantis has not officially declared his campaign, he has been touring the country and setting the stage for a 2024 run.
Trump held a re-election rally in Waco, Texas as he was mocking the current potential indictment by Manhattan D.A. Alvin Bragg claiming an indictment on him would be an indictment on the voters in a speech on Saturday.
“They’re not coming after me — they’re coming after you and I’ll stand in their way because in 2024, we’ll have the greatest victory of them all,” Trump said to a crowd on Saturday in at the Waco Regional Airport.
The crowd was silent after Trump mocked DeSantis accusing the Florida governor begging for his endorsement in 2018.
“So, he came, and he really wanted [my endorsement]. I said, ‘You can’t win, can you? How do you – can [you] win?'” Trump said, recalling the alleged conversation with DeSantis. “‘Sir, if you endorse me, I’ll win. Please, please, sir, endorse me,'” Trump said about endorsing DeSantis.
New polls from New Hampshire and Iowa show DeSantis gaining momentum and ranking high compared to Trump.
DeSantis is currently revamping his political strategy and messaging as his presidential are speculated as possibly faltering.
“I think for all the fanfare about DeSantis, there’s still a lot of stuff he needs to work on,” said one Republican strategist, who plans to back the Florida governor in the 2024 primary if he runs. “That’s normal when you’re exploring this kind of thing. But I think he needs to rethink things a little bit.”
In Iowa, DeSantis recently saw 45% of support among Republican voters, according to a poll from Public Opinion Strategies in March, as shared by Axios.
In the same poll, Trump received 37% of Republican votes.
The poll gave potential voters only two potential candidates: DeSantis and Trump.
In New Hampshire, Republican voters were mixed on DeSantis and Trump in the hypothetical head-to-head matchup, with each candidate getting 39% of the vote.
DeSantis had a favorable rating of 81% in Iowa and a favorable rating of 77% in New Hampshire. The Florida governor received unfavorable ratings of 11% and 15% in Iowa and New Hampshire, respectively.
Trump had a favorable rating of 74% in Iowa and 69% in New Hampshire. Trump’s unfavorable rating was 24% in Iowa and 29% in New Hampshire.
Outside the head-to-head battles, polls conducted giving voters more than two options saw a different result.
In Iowa, DeSantis and Trump tied when voters could pick from other candidates like Nikki Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy.
In New Hampshire, DeSantis trails Trump by 12 points when other candidates are listed.
The new polls show DeSantis performing better in Iowa and New Hampshire than most other states and major national polls.
The trend continues to emerge that Trump does better in polls and hypothetical matchups of more than two Republican candidates. This could spell trouble for DeSantis as more potential candidates enter the mix.
Trump won the 2016 Republican nomination in a primary with over a dozen candidates at the start of the race.
While the 2024 election is over a year-and-a-half away, polls will continue to show how voters are favoring potential candidates and could provide a glimpse at what the election will look like.
Incumbent President Joe Biden has yet to announce his re-election bid with low approval ratings at 41% in a Gallup poll conducted in the month of February. Former President George W. Bush sat with an approval from 46% to 53% in a May 2004 poll prior to his re-election win against former Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry. Biden is likely to face the same obstacle that Bush faced for his re-election bid.
A YouGov poll showed that Democrats had more of a dislike for Trump than DeSantis heading into the 2024 election.
“I think most Democrats would be terrified of another Trump presidency, but I also think that most Democrats would not be happy about a DeSantis presidency and maybe think DeSantis is a lot like Trump but ‘more competent’ or something,” said Hans Noel, a professor of government at Georgetown University. “I don’t know if that’s the right interpretation, but it’s definitely one that a lot of Democrats have.”
Trump is currently running favorability in the polls that includes baggage with January 6 and the multiple investigations.
Produced in association with Benzinga
