A new poll shows Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) narrowly beating President Joe Biden in a hypothetical matchup, while former President Trump trails by eight points.
Surveying 1,035 voters between January 2-8, with a margin of error +/- 3 percent, the WPA Intelligence poll conducted for the conservative Club for Growth showed that President Joe Biden leads his former rival Donald Trump by eight points, while Ron DeSantis narrowly leads the current president despite his lack of name recognition. Per NBC News:
The poll shows Trump losing to Biden 41-48% — an 8-percentage point disadvantage for the Republican that’s outside the poll’s 3-point error margin. But in a head-to-head matchup against DeSantis, Biden gets 42% of the theoretical vote compared to 45% for the Florida governor, which is essentially a statistical tie.
To test people’s knowledge of the candidates, WPA Intelligence used a relatively novel approach in its survey by showing voters a picture of each of the three politicians and then asking respondents to either type the name of the man from memory or click an option acknowledging they didn’t know who they were. Both Biden and Trump were known to 98% of the electorate each; but only 64% knew who DeSantis was.
Despite the name recognition enjoyed by both Biden and Trump, DeSantis still had the edge over both. David McIntosh, the president of the Club for Growth, told NBC News that the poll shows DeSantis has a wide advantage.
“Of all the three candidates, DeSantis is the one who has room to grow … and yet he still has high favorable, he still beats Biden, whereas Trump loses to him,” said McIntosh. “As more people start to recognize DeSantis, his face, there’s a lot of upside for him to grow and get stronger.”
A Suffolk University survey last month also showed the Florida governor narrowly beating Joe Biden in a hypothetical 2024 matchup. However, as Breitbart News reported, a recent Morning Consult poll showed former President Donald Trump beating DeSantis and other likely primary rivals by double-digits:
Morning Consult’s latest ‘2024 GOP Primary Tracker’ survey, conducted from January 6-8, shows that 46 percent of potential Republican primary voters support Trump in his bid for the presidential nomination. Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) sits 13 points back in second place with 33 percent, while nine percent of respondents back former Vice President Mike Pence. No other candidate came close to approaching double-digit support.
DeSantis has not indicated if he would run for president.