The 2024 Republican Presidential Primary Race – October 11th, 2023
Bottom Line: The most interesting dynamic in presidential primary politics over the past week doesn’t involve a Republican presidential candidate, or at this point one who’s a Democrat. Lifelong Democrat RFK Jr.’s decision to leave the Democrat Party, in lieu of an independent bid, creates the most credible 3rd party bid for president since Ross Perot’s efforts in the 90’s. Meanwhile, in Republican presidential primary politics the past week has largely brought more of the same.
We’re two weeks removed from the 2nd Presidential Primary debate. Trump’s polling lead was 43-points over his closest competition (Ron DeSantis) before the 2nd debate, it’s now 44-points two weeks after the 2nd debate. That’s also a lead that’s four points higher than prior to the first debate. It's clear that Trump’s decision to skip the debates has worked out perfectly fine for him. Only one candidate is polling higher than they were prior to that first debate... Nikki Haley. The former and perhaps future President of the United States continues to dominate the field of candidates.
Here's where the Republican primary candidates stand in the current average of national polls which also factored into which candidates were eligible to participate in the 2nd debate (changes are compared to a week ago):
- Trump: 57% (flat)
- DeSantis: 13% (-1)
- Haley: 7% (flat)
- Ramaswamy: 6% (+1)
- Pence: 4% (flat)
- Christie: 2% (-1)
- Scott: 2% (-1)
- Burgum: 1% (flat)
As the weeks tick by with little conviction for any Trump challenger, the feeling of inevitability continues to grow. Trump already has a larger polling lead, by a wide margin, than any that’s been overcome by a candidate who’s gone on to win a party’s nomination. For perspective on just how impressive Trump’s lead over the Republican field of candidates is, Biden’s lead over RFK Jr. at the time of his departure from the Democrat primary race, was only 3-points larger than Trump’s lead over DeSantis. Effectively former President Trump is running stronger against the large field of Republican candidates than President Biden was against only two challengers. Trump’s 57% support among GOP primary voters exceeds the level of support he had a year ago when only a few candidates were polled alongside him. He remains at a high-water mark in this cycle.
The primary contest is still about what happens in individual states, as opposed to national polls, however those have been favorable for Trump as well. Trump enjoys a current polling lead of 33-points in Iowa, 31-points in New Hampshire, 33-points in South Carolina and 42-points in Nevada. Until next week...