This Q-Poll from Quinnipiac University shows Donald Trump as its biggest loser in the sense that he loses to Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden (who isn’t even in the race) and Socialist Bernie Sanders.
According to the Q-Poll, Hillary “gets 45 percent to Trump’s 43 percent.” Meanwhile, Vice President Biden defeats “Trump 51 – 40 percent.” Finally, Bernie Sanders “tops Trump 47 – 42 percent.” That isn’t good news for Trump. Hillary loses to Carly Fiorina 44% to 43%, 44% to 42% to Jeb Bush and 49% to 42$ to Ben Carson. Meanwhile, “Biden gets 46 percent to 43 percent for Fiorina and beats Bush 46 – 41 percent and Trump 51 – 40 percent. Biden and Carson are tied 45 – 45 percent.” Finally, “Sanders gets 43 percent to Fiorina’s 44 percent and ties Bush 44 – 44 percent. Sanders trails Carson 49 – 39 percent.”
Trump’s polling trajectory is plateauing, too:
The latest national Quinnipiac University survey released Thursday provided some fuel to wishful rivals. Trump still leads among registered Republican voters with 25 percent, statistically unchanged from last month’s Quinnipiac survey that put him at 28 percent. Yet it’s the second major national poll this week showing a slight decrease from last month, Trump experienced an 8-point drop in the CNN/ORC survey released Sunday. (A Fox poll released Wednesday evening also showed Trump with relatively stalled momentum, and a Bloomberg survey of the GOP field showed Trump in a holding pattern at 21 percent).
The question that hasn’t been answered is whether Trump’s floor of support is his ceiling. That’s unknowable at this point. What isn’t unknowable, though, is whether others are gaining ground. Fiorina, Rubio and Carson definitely are gaining on Trump. Here’s Chris Stirewalt’s observation on that:
You already know about one of the main areas of agreement in the polls: Carly Fiorina, Sen. Marco Rubio and Ben Carson all emerged stronger from last week’s contest.
Trump loves bragging about leading this primary or that. What’s odd is that the media hasn’t asked him why his GOP rivals fare significantly better than him in the general election match-ups. Fiorina and Rubio are significantly stronger candidates against Hillary than Trump is.
If the goal is to elect a conservative as president, Trump isn’t your guy. He’s defeated by the Democrats’ ‘Big Three’ in fairly convincing fashion. It’s too early for GOP candidates to tout the electability issue but there will come a point when Fiorina and Rubio will start playing that card. Their argument will essentially be ‘Don’t waste your vote supporting a guy who can’t beat Hillary.’ It wouldn’t be surprising if that argument isn’t a powerful argument in mid-January.
