Florida GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis' campaign is hailing his strength in key battleground states, and the latest Marquette University Law School Poll has him virtually tied with former President Donald Trump in Wisconsin.
Trump still leads by 1 point (31%) over DeSantis (30%) among Republican registered voters or independents that lean Republican, but it is well within the poll's margin of error, making the race a virtual or statistical tie.
But DeSantis (47%) does better (-2 points) against President Joe Biden (49%) than Trump did in the poll (-9 points, 52%-43%).
The full GOP primary results in the poll:
- Trump 31%.
- DeSantis 30%.
- Former Vice President Mike Pence 6%.
- Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., 5%.
- Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley 3%.
- Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy 3%.
- Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie 1%.
- Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson less than 1%.
- Former California gubernatorial candidate Larry Elder less than 1%.
- North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum 0%.
There was an unusually high number of voters undecided at 21%, and among those undecided voters, DeSantis draws 65% support to Trump's 28%.
Also, among those picking neither Trump nor DeSantis, DeSantis draws 74% support as a second choice to Trump's 25%.
While this is strong polling numbers for DeSantis in the key battleground state that helped decide the 2020 presidential election for Biden, DeSantis remains a large underdog in most of the 2024 GOP primary states, making his path to the GOP nomination difficult, even if he is a favorable choice in key battleground states.
Marquette University Law School conducted the poll June 8-13 among 913 Wisconsin registered voters, with a margin of error of plus or minus 4.3 percentage points. Among 419 Republicans and independents who lean Republican it has a large margin of error of plus or minus 6.5 percentage points.