DeSantis lagging behind Trump in New Hampshire: poll

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is losing support to former President Donald Trump among GOP voters in New Hampshire, according to a poll released Tuesday — as the candidates visited the Granite State.

Trump topped the GOP field with 47% support from registered Republican primary-race voters in the state, with DeSantis behind at 19%, in the latest poll by the Saint Anselm College Survey Center.

“We’re leading by a lot. I mean, I’d have to work really hard to blow this one,” Trump told attendees at a New Hampshire Federation of Republican Women’s Lilac Luncheon on Tuesday.

DeSantis delivered his own speech hours earlier in Hollis, taking a swipe at Trump for overpromising on border security during his presidency.

“We’re actually going to build the wall,” DeSantis said at the town hall.

“A lot of politicians chirp. They make grandiose promises and then fail to deliver the actual results. The time for excuses is over. Now is the time to deliver results and finally get the job done,” he added — just one day after unveiling his own immigration policy proposal on the Texas-Mexico border.

Asked whether Trump had “drained the swamp,” or addressed DC corruption and waste, during his time in the Oval Office, DeSantis also lashed out at the former president.

“He didn’t drain it. It’s worse today than it’s ever been,” DeSantis told the audience before adding that he would cut in half the number of federal employees if he is elected. “I want to break the swamp.”

GOP former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie came in third place in the poll of registered Republican voters with 6% support, followed by ex-UN Ambassador Nikki Haley at 5% and South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott with 4%.

Biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, former Vice President Mike Pence and former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson polled at 2% support in New Hampshire — whose primaries are slated for early next year.

Recently announced candidate and Miami mayor Francis Suarez received 0% support.

The Saint Anselm poll surveyed a total of 1,065 New Hampshire registered voters in both the Republican and Democratic parties by cell phone between June 21 and 23, with a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

The college’s last survey in March showed Trump with 42% Republican voter support in New Hampshire, DeSantis with 29% and former state Gov. Chris Sununu at 14%. Sununu has since announced he will not seek the presidency in 2024.

Trump has since become the first former president to be twice-indicted — in Manhattan on 34 counts of business fraud and in Miami on 37 counts related to his alleged mishandling of classified material.

Fifty-five percent of the total voters polled in June said the indictments were legitimate.

The poll also showed that President Biden remains the frontrunner for the Democratic Party, with 68% of New Hampshire primary Dem voters supporting the incumbent.

Dem challengers Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and spiritual guru Marianne Williamson are well behind Biden among Democratic voters at 9% and 8% support, respectively.

Biden also would be the overall favorite if he faces off against Trump in 2024.

Forty-nine percent of all of the voters polled favored him, compared to 40% for Trump. Voters also said they would vote for Biden over DeSantis by the same margin.

But 83% of all voters surveyed said a Biden-Trump match-up would signal that the party system is broken.

DeSantis said during his address in Hollis that the Republican Party would only continue its “culture of losing” if it selects Trump as its presidential candidate, while noting the prediction of a “massive red wave” of Republican wins in the 2022 midterm elections that failed to materialize.

“We had a red wave in Florida — but that’s because we delivered results in Florida,” DeSantis said, referring his gubernatorial re-election victory.

Just 14% of Republicans and 6% of Democrats polled said a 2020 rematch of Biden and Trump would represent the best the parties have to offer.

Biden’s age may also factor into the race, as 70% of all voters and 50% of Democrats voiced concerns about the 80-year-old incumbent.

Just 34% of the total voters polled had the same concerns about the 77-year-old Trump.

The poll also showed that voters are not inclined to relitigate issues from the 2020 election concerning fraud or first son Hunter Biden’s laptop scandal.

Only 27% of all of the voters polled in the Granite State believe the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Trump. A much larger share, 42%, said they believe Hunter Biden’s laptop is a legitimate election issue.

Among Republican voters, half believe the 2020 election was rigged, 78% think the Hunter laptop controversy is a legitimate issue, and 76% say the indictments against the former president were politically motivated.

Trump said during his lunch stop that President Biden is “crooked as hell” and read in full from a text message Hunter Biden allegedly sent to a Chinese businessman in which he used his father as leverage to close a deal.

An IRS whistleblower revealed the WhatsApp exchange between the first son and CEFC China Energy executive Raymond Zhao during testimony last month to the House Ways and Means Committee, which was made public last week

Meanwhile, voters also said the economy, abortion and government spending and taxes were in the top three issues for 2024.