A small but significant percentage of Republican primary voters say that if Donald Trump is the Republican nominee, they would not vote for him in the General Election, the Associated Press reported.
According to an analysis of data from AP VoteCast, a series of surveys conducted by the Associated Press-NORC Center in primary and caucus states, Trump faces potential problems expanding his base of support within the Republican party as he prepares to face off against President Biden in November.
The VoteCast surveys in the first three primary/caucus states found that 20 percent of Iowa voters, a third of New Hampshire voters, and 25 percent of South Carolina voters said they would be so dissatisfied with a Trump nomination that they would not vote for him in November.
VoteCast also found a similar sentiment from Republicans who have yet to vote in the primaries.
Two Colorado Republicans who attended a campaign event for Nikki Haley before the state’s primary on Super Tuesday said they were supporting Haley out of fear that Trump’s legal problems would disqualify him.
They told the Associated Press that if Trump was the nominee, they wouldn’t vote for Biden but didn’t know if they could vote for Trump.
Many of the primary voters surveyed who said they would not vote for Trump weren’t registered Republicans. In the surveys conducted in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina, VoteCast found that between 17 percent to 31 percent of the voters who said they would not vote for Trump in November were registered Democrats. Between 14 to 21 percent were independents.
Among anti-Trump Republican voters, between half and two-thirds surveyed in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina said they voted for Joe Biden in 2020.
While voter turnout tends to be small in primary elections and caucuses, about 10 percent of the voters in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina who voted for Trump in the 2020 election said they would not vote for him again in 2024 if he is the nominee.
