Republican pollster Frank Luntz replied that he “would bet on” former President Donald Trump upon being asked after Wednesday night’s CNN debate whom he predicts will win the 2024 presidential election.
A CBS News reporter asked Luntz after the debate, “If you had to bet $150,000 on who’s going to win in November, who would you bet on?”
“I never dreamed that I would say this, but I would bet on Trump. I never – I thought it was done. I thought it was over,” he said.
“You don’t come back from an impeachment, you don’t come back from January 6, you don’t come back from any of this, but he’s come back,” he added. “The guy’s a survivor, and his opponent is having so much trouble that I would, at this point, give the edge to Trump.
When Breitbart News reached out to Luntz to confirm this occurred after the CNN debate, he attempted to walk back his comments from two days prior, saying that a poor performance in the Iowa Caucuses for Trump could upend the entire dynamic of the race.
“I wouldn’t put much stock in it. All that could change on Monday if Trump has a bad showing,” he wrote via text.
But all signs indicate Trump is heading into Iowa from a position of immense strength. Currently, he averages 53 percent of support in Iowa on RealClearPolling’s average as of Friday afternoon. He sits 35.2 points ahead of his nearest competitor, former Gov. Nikki Haley (R-SC), who lands at 17.8 percent.
In December, Luntz predicted that Trump’s removal from the Colorado ballot in a 4-3 decision from the state Supreme Court, which has ultimately been stayed until the U.S. Supreme Court weighs in, would only propel Trump in the polls:
He explained to CNN’s Pamela Brown in late December that “the more that he is prosecuted, the more that he is condemned, the higher his numbers go as people rally around him.”
“Trump is now even more likely to beat Biden,” Luntz added.