The latest poll taken of Utah Republican caucus-goers shows Donald Trump in a distant third place trailing the state’s frontrunner U.S. Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Ohio Governor John Kasich.
Currently polling indicates Cruz is positioned to take all of the state’s delegates as he is polling above 50%.
- Ted Cruz – 53%
- John Kasich – 29%
- Donald Trump – 11%
The Salt Lake City Tribune reports:
The Y2 Analytics poll was conducted from Thursday to Saturday and included 500 respondents, capturing some of the reaction from public events held by all three of the Republican candidates. Cruz held three public events in Utah on Saturday with Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, commentator Glenn Beck and former presidential candidate Carly Fiorina.
….Only 29 percent of the respondents promised to vote for Trump in a general election, while 25 percent said they would write in another candidate, 15 percent said they’d vote for a third-party candidate and 7 percent said they’d back the Democrat.
Mitt Romney recently said he would vote for Cruz in the Utah Caucus, and Cruz also has the support of U.S. Senator Mike Lee (R-UT).
Cruz leading in Utah is not a surprise, what is a surprise is that another poll shows that Trump would not win this heavily Republican state if he were the Republican nominee.
Deseret News along with KSL administered a poll which showed Trump has general election problems in the state.
Deseret News reports:
The poll found that may well be true. Utah voters said they would reject Trump, the GOP frontrunner, whether former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton or Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders is the Democratic candidate on the general election ballot.
While Clinton was only slightly ahead of Trump — 38 percent to 36 percent — Sanders, a self-declared Democratic socialist, holds a substantial lead — 48 percent to 37 percent over the billionaire businessman and reality TV star among likely Utah voters.
Both Cruz and Kasich would beat either Democratic candidate.
Trump has made a point to say he’d bring out different voters to the polls. He would also keep plenty home it seems. If Trump can’t win in Utah how in would does he think he can win in states that are typically not friendly to Republicans?