Former President Donald Trump is maintaining his status as the most favorable candidate in the potential 2024 Republican presidential field, Tuesday’s Morning Consult survey found.
Trump did not lose any favorability this week, maintaining his status as 77 percent have a favorable view of him, compared to 20 percent who do not. That 20 percent is down from the 21 percent who viewed him unfavorably in last week’s results.
Like last week’s results, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) comes in second place with 67 percent viewing him favorably — one point less than the 68 percent who said the same last week.
Once again, however, DeSantis has nine percent who have never heard of him and 11 percent who have heard of him but have no opinion. Trump does not face the hurdle of a lack of recognizability. Meanwhile, another 13 percent view DeSantis unfavorably. That is also one point less than the 14 percent who viewed the Sunshine State governor unfavorably last week.
According to Morning Consult, former Vice President Mike Pence experienced the biggest hit in terms of losing favorability this week:
Pence’s Popularity Takes Hit: Former Vice President Mike Pence’s favorability rating among potential primary voters declined from 60% to 55% during a week that featured news coverage of his condemnation of Trump’s behavior surrounding the Jan. 6 Capitol attack. Over the same time period, the share who said they’d recently heard something negative about Pence, who is polling at 7% in the nominating race, increased from 15% to 24%.
No other potential candidate saw over 50 percent favorability, as Haley came in behind Pence with 47 percent viewing her favorably and 16 percent viewing her unfavorably. However 21 percent said they have never heard of her, and another 16 percent said they have heard of her but have no opinion. Other potential candidates, including Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) and Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R), also suffer from a lack of name recognition. Presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy appears to suffer the worst from this, as most, 54 percent, have never heard of him.
This also coincides with Trump growing in popularity among Republicans, as he has expanded his lead over DeSantis from +24 last week to +28 this week. Trump gained two points of support in the last week, jumping from 52 percent to 54 percent, while DeSantis lost two points, going from 28 percent to 26 percent:
The favorability portion of the survey was taken March 17-19, 2023, among 813 potential Republican primary voters and has a +/-4 margin of error. Notably, the survey was taken in the midst of Trump announcing a looming indictment at the hands of leftist Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.
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