Yesterday’s PPP report showed that Ted Cruz’s entry into the presidential race has shaken up the polls.
Republican Primary voters, March 26 through March 31st (PDF):
– Scott Walker 20% (down from 25%)
– Jeb Bush 17% (steady)
– Ted Cruz 16% (up from 5%)
– Ben Carson and Rand Paul 10%
– Marco Rubio and Mike Huckabee 6%
– Chris Christie 4%
– Rick Perry 3%
From PPP:
Cruz has really caught fire with voters identifying themselves as ‘very conservative’ since his announcement. After polling at only 11% with them a month ago, he now leads the GOP field with 33% to 25% for Walker and 12% for Carson with no one else in double digits.
Now that the “severely conservative” wing of the party has a standard bearer, the 2016 nominating contest is starting to shape up as a race between the establishment, the true believers, and those who have not yet figured out that when Scott Walker says “you don’t have to move to the center to win the center” he means that he lies to the center to get them to vote for him. The Wall Street Journal is making it their business to point out every Walker flip-and-flop because Jeb(!).
From Ed Kilgore:
We’ll soon see if Carson or Huckabee can get some of this support back, or if it’s leeched away by Scott Walker, or if Rick Perry or Bobby Jindal or Rick Santorum or some combination of them can poach on it with their own announcement events. All I’ll say at this point is that it sure looks like a different nominating contest dynamic with someone clearly on top of the hard-core conservative pile than without it. A more divided right-wing vote keeps Jeb Bush at or near the top.
As the Republican Party moves further and further away from the mainstream, with their anti-immigration, anti-gay agenda, Ted Cruz will become the face of the Republican Party. Purdy, ain’t it?
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