Former Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens (R) is in the lead for the Republican nomination to fill retiring Sen. Roy Blunt’s (R-MO) seat, a new Fox4/Emerson College/The Hill poll found.
Twenty-six percent of 1,000 likely Republican primary voters polled last week said they intend to vote for Greitens. The former governor holds a six-point lead over competitor Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, which is outside the survey’s three percent margin of error. Greitens also holds a ten-point lead over Rep. Vicky Hartzler (R-MO). Rep. Billy Long (R-MO) came in fourth place with eight percent, and Mark McCloskey came in fifth with four percent.
“It’s him (Greitens) or Schmitt it seems like at this point. Hartzler does have that support among women and some more statewide name recognition than say her colleague Billy Long, so I would say that it’s a bit of a three-way race at this point because you do have some time between now and the primary day,” Camille Mumford, communications director at Emerson College Polling, told Fox4.
The survey found that Greitens favorability is ten points higher with women (27 percent) than men (24 percent). Hartzler received the second-largest amount of support from women (18 percent). Schmitt garnered slightly more support from men than Greitens (25 percent).
Notably, 45 percent of respondents said they could change their minds, though 55 percent said they will stick with the candidate they selected in the survey.
“Within that, a stronger majority of people who support Greitens and Hartzler are sticking with their candidate compared to Schmitt supporters, which it’s still a majority,” Mumford said. “It is still 55 percent of folks who say they’ll definitely support him in the primary election and won’t change their mind. However, it does seem like his support is a bit softer than Greitens and Hartzler voters.”
The poll found that an endorsement from former President Donald Trump would heavily influence how Republicans vote in the primary, which is roughly two months away. Nearly half (49 percent) of voters said they would be more likely to vote for a Trump-endorsed candidate. Forty-one percent said Trump’s endorsement would not affect their vote, and ten percent said they would be less likely to vote for a candidate with Trump’s backing.
Trump has not yet endorsed a candidate in the Missouri U.S. Senate race, though Greitens has garnered the backing of Kimberly Guilfoyle, who is engaged to Donald Trump Jr. The former president’s son has also praised Greitens in recent months, and the two even went shooting together. Greitens previously told Springfield’s KY3 that an endorsement from the former president would provide an “important” boost to any of the candidates.
“President Trump’s endorsement is probably one of the most important factors,” Greitens said. “The most important thing is that we take the country back. We take it back with really strong America first leadership.”