DeSantis attributes Trump rise in polling to ‘sympathy’ over Manhattan indictment

Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis Sunday attributed former President Trump’s growing lead in polls to the public sympathy he received after being indicted in New York. 

DeSantis said he shared the view with “a lot of people” that Trump’s indictment over alleged hush money payments leading up to the 2016 election was a “miscarriage of justice” in an interview on Fox News’s “MediaBuzz” with Howard Kurtz. That sympathy, along with more media coverage, DeSantis claimed, explained the widening gap between Trump and DeSantis in polls.

“At the end of the day, the [Manhattan District Attorney Alvin] Bragg indictment just elevated him,” DeSantis said of Trump. “And it wasn’t so much that people were doing it because he was indicted. I think a lot of people, including me, believe that it was a miscarriage of justice.”

“I think there was a lot of sympathy. But then, I think just dominating the media coverage,” DeSantis added.

Trump has been dominating recent polls. A Morning Consult poll showed recently that, among GOP voters surveyed, 56 percent favored Trump in a hypothetical primary. DeSantis came in second at a distant 17 percent. 

An April poll from Morning Consult had Trump’s support still at 56 percent among GOP voters surveyed, but DeSantis came in second at 23 percent. In January, the gap was even closer between the two leading candidates: A Morning Consult poll had Trump at 48 percent support among hypothetical GOP primary voters, while DeSantis had 31 percent. 

DeSantis said he was not concerned about national polls, noting he was spending significant time in some early primary states.