Trump widens lead over DeSantis to 34 points: CNN poll

Former President Trump’s national lead over Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis among the 2024 GOP White House candidates has widened to 34 points, according to a CNN primary poll published Tuesday.

Among Republicans and Republican-leaning independents who are registered to vote, 52 percent said they were most likely to support Trump for the party’s nomination, whereas 18 percent said the same for DeSantis. 

The poll, conducted Aug. 25-31, shows a notable change from the previous June 13-17 poll, which found a 21 percentage point gap between the two candidates. A prior poll, conducted May 17-20, found a 27 point gap between the front-runner and his nearest national challenger. The one before that, conducted March 8-12, found just a 4 point gap. 

In the four CNN polls conducted since March, DeSantis has seen a relatively steady decline. His support was at 36 percent in March, 26 percent in both the May and June polls and 18 percent in the most recent August ones. 

Only 19 percent of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents in the latest survey said they would not support Trump under any circumstances, a drop from June, when 23 percent said the same.

When asked about DeSantis, 22 percent of those surveyed in the August poll said they would not support him under any circumstances, similar to the 21 percent who said the same in June.

When asked how likely Trump is to win the GOP nomination, only 11 percent said “not too likely” or “not likely at all.” A total of 60 percent said either “extremely likely” or “very likely,” and 29 percent said “somewhat likely.”

The most recent poll was conducted by SSRS via web and telephone. It was taken among 1,503 respondents, with an oversample of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents for a total of 898, 784 of whom were registered to vote. The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.