There was an eight-point swing to former President Donald Trump away from Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) among likely Republican primary voters after Wednesday night’s second debate.
Two days before Wednesday’s debate, Trump had 58 percent support in Morning Consult’s poll. After the debate, where he did not appear, Trump’s support surged to 63 percent.
On the other hand, DeSantis fell three points in the poll, down to 12 percent from the 15 percent he held on Monday.
Trump now holds a 51-point advantage over DeSantis, according to Morning Consult’s poll.
“The sizable shift from Monday to Thursday is notable compared with what happened after the first Republican debate in August, when our Thursday post-debate survey found no significant change in the GOP electorate’s views,” pollster Morning Consult explained.
Vivek Ramaswamy also dropped two points, bringing his support down to seven percent after Wednesday’s debate. No other candidate polled higher than five percent after the debate.
The second GOP debate saw a 26 percent drop in viewership from the first debate without Trump held last month.
As Breitbart News reported:
While the first GOP debate without Trump captured 12.8 million TV viewers, less than 10 million watched the second debate, according to Nielsen. Just 9.3 million viewers tuned in for the debate across Fox News, Fox Business, and Univision, marking a 26 percent decline in viewers from last month’s debate.
Trump, who is leading by as many as 50 points in the polls, is not participating in the GOP debates due to his polling advantage. Instead of attending Wednesday’s debate, Trump addressed striking autoworkers in Michigan.
Morning Consult surveyed 1,183 likely Republican primary voters on September 28, the day after the second GOP debate. The survey’s margin of error is ±3 percent.
Jordan Dixon-Hamilton is a reporter for Breitbart News. Write to him at jdixonhamilton@breitbart.com or follow him on Twitter.
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