Donald Trump and Ted Cruz have solidified their positions atop the Republican presidential pack, but their success doesn’t bode well for the Republican Party’s chances of reclaiming the White House, according to a new poll.
Trump, who’s topped GOP national surveys since July, takes a beating against Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton, with the former secretary of state claiming 50% to Trump’s 40%, according an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll released Monday.
Cruz is also behind Clinton in a general election match-up — albeit by a slimmer margin — as Cruz falling 3 points short of Clinton’s 48% support in the poll.
Cruz, a freshman senator from Texas, has inched closer to threatening Trump’s front-runner status in the latest NBC/Wall Street Journal poll on the GOP race, taking 22% to Trump’s 27%.
Clinton, who continues to lead the Democratic field by 20 points according to the poll, does not fare as well in the general election when matched up against Cruz’s colleague in the Senate, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio.
Rubio, who now sits in third place in the GOP horse race with 15%, would defeat Clinton 48% to 45%, according to the NBC/Wall Street Journal poll.
Rubio performs strongly among independents against Clinton — 44% to 37% — and narrows the Democrat’s advantage with Hispanics, clinching 36% of that demographic to Clinton’s 59%.
And while Ben Carson’s stock may be plummeting in the race for the Republican nomination — he’s slipped from once threatening Trump’s lead position to a fourth place finish in the latest polls — the retired neurosurgeon remains competitive with the likely Democratic nominee.
Carson faces a dead heat when matched with Clinton in a hypothetical general election, taking 47% to Clinton’s 46%, according to the poll.
The results are based on a survey of 1,000 adults with a margin of error of +/- 3.36 percentage points.