Cruz Now Leads Trump Among GOP Candidates In Latest KTVT-CBS 11 / Dixie Strategies Texas Poll
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NORTH TEXAS (CBSDFW.COM) -- The latest KTVT-CBS 11 / Dixie Strategies Poll of over 1,700 likely primary voters in Texas shows a change at the top in the race for the GOP nomination. While Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders numbers are rising, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is still dominating among Democrat likely voters.
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PRIMARY
According to the poll taken January 25-26, Texas Senator Ted Cruz now leads real estate mogul Donald Trump among the GOP Candidates by 5 percentage points with Cruz at 30.27% and Trump 25.27% overall. That's a big change from the previous poll taken in October of 2016 when Dr. Ben Carson had a slight lead over Trump.
Carson saw a sharp fall off compared to the previous poll. Overall, only 5.29% of respondents chose Carson as their candidate compared to 22.93% previously.
Conversely, Florida Senator Marco Rubio is gaining some ground against the front runners. Now 11.99% of likely voters chose Rubio compared to only 6.57% back in October.
Cruz leads among those who identified as very conservative while Trump leads among those who identify as somewhat conservative or moderate.
Among DFW area GOP likely voters, Cruz remains the frontrunner. Rubio's showing is a little stronger than the state-wide results. In DFW, 13.89% of GOP likely voters chose Rubio as their candidate with 23.61% choosing Trump and 27.08% choosing Cruz.
All other GOP candidates are polling in the single digits. Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush (8.29%), Carson (5.29%) and New Jersey Governor Chris Christie (3.30%) round out the top of that pack. The rest of the GOP candidates are polling under 3%.
While Senator Sanders has gained some ground among likely Democrat voters, the poll shows Clinton still holds a commanding lead over her rivals. Clinton was almost 50 points ahead of Sanders in the October poll. Now, her lead is down to 34 points. Clinton still holds the top spot with 50.33% compared to Sanders' 15.51%.
The "Undecided" totals still remain high state wide among Democrat likely voters with 28.68% yet to commit to a candidate.
Clinton's strength in DFW remains strong but Sanders has gained some ground on her there as well.
FAVORABILITY
Participants were also asked again to rate the "Favorability" of both President Obama and Governor Abbott as well.
The president's favorability has dropped somewhat since the October poll was taken. Overall, 39.64% of respondents viewed President Obama as "Very" or "Somewhat" Favorable compared to 44.36% previously; and 54.99% viewed him as "Very" or "Somewhat" Unfavorable compared to 49.97% previously.
Governor Abbott's favorability remained largely unchanged but his unfavorable number jumped about 3 points. When asked about Abbott, 56.26% of respondents viewed Abbott as "Very" or "Somewhat" Favorable compared to 56.98% previously; and 34.31% viewed him as "Very" or "Somewhat" Unfavorable compared to 29.53% previously with most of that gain largely coming from those who were previously undecided about the governor's performance.
This poll contains the results of a telephone survey of 1,001 "likely" Republican Presidential Primary voters statewide. The Margin of Error is ± 3.1%. For Democrats, there were 767 "likely" Presidential Primary voters statewide polled. The Margin of error in that survey is ± 3.54%. The results were gathered January 25-26, 2016.
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