Former President Donald Trump has drawn more support from South Carolina GOP voters in his bid for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination than the state's former governor, Nikki Haley, or Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., a new Winthrop University poll found.
Trump was the top candidate for 41% of survey respondents, followed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis at 20%. DeSantis has not yet announced his candidacy but is widely expected to after the Florida Legislature's session concludes in May. Haley, the Palmetto State's former executive, placed third, with 18%.
Also undeclared as a candidate, Scott was supported by 7% of poll respondents. According to Politico, the South Carolina senator announced the formation of a presidential exploratory committee on Wednesday.
"Trump is riding high and doubling support over the next candidate in the field," Winthrop's poll director, Scott Huffmon, said in a statement included in the Wednesday release.
The poll comes a week after Trump became the first president, sitting or former, to be indicted, on 34 felony counts stemming from hush money payments made to porn star Stormy Daniels in 2016. Among Republicans, it is believed that the former president is being unfairly targeted, as he has surged in the polls and his campaign has raked in at least $10 million since the indictment.
Former Vice President Mike Pence came in at 5%, followed by former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo at 2%, and New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu with 1%.
South Carolina is a key early primary voting state. In the 2024 primary race, Republicans there will vote third in the nation, after Iowa and New Hampshire. Democrats voted in December to remove Iowa as the first state on their presidential nominating calendar and replace it with South Carolina starting in 2024.
The poll was conducted March 25 to April 1 and surveyed 1,657 South Carolina adults, including 485 self-identified Republicans who are registered to vote. The margin of error for all respondents was plus or minus 2.41 percentage points and plus or minus 4.45 percentage points among Republican voters.
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