Former President Donald Trump continued to steamroll his GOP rivals in a new poll from CNN conducted by the University of New Hampshire released on Thursday. However, Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley firmly overtook all other 2024 rivals for second place, further cementing her campaign's claims that she is the best candidate who can take on Trump and President Joe Biden.
The poll showed Trump at 42% among likely Granite State Republican primary voters, with Haley at 20%, followed by former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie at 14%, Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) at 9%, and biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy at 8%. None of the other candidates surpassed 2% support.
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Haley has seen her support among New Hampshire GOP voters rise 8 percentage points since CNN and the University of New Hampshire last conducted the poll in September. In contrast, Ramaswamy, who was in second place in the fall, saw his support decrease by 5 percentage points, while Trump, Christie, and DeSantis remained steady in their support.
The poll also matches another survey of New Hampshire voters from Emerson College released on Wednesday that showed the former South Carolina governor surging to second place at 18%, a 14 percentage point increase since August, behind Trump at 49%. The momentum for Haley comes in the wake of three solid debate performances in August, September, and October and put her on a full-on collision course with DeSantis, whose status as Trump's chief competitor may be fading.
Among registered GOP voters in New Hampshire, 55% are backing Trump, 17% support Haley, and 11% are backing DeSantis. Undeclared voters, who are not registered with either party but likely to vote in the GOP primary, were more divided in their support, with 25% supporting Haley, 24% backing Trump, and 24% supporting DeSantis. Undeclared voters make up roughly 43% support of likely GOP primary voters who were surveyed.
The poll also showed more than half of voters, 57%, said Trump has the best possibility of winning the general election next year, a 6 percentage point increase from the September poll. A majority of voters, 54%, said they would feel at least satisfied if Haley became the nominee. Undeclared voters were more likely to be satisfied if Haley were the nominee at 50% compared to 44% of undeclared voters who would be satisfied if Trump were the nominee.
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New Hampshire Secretary of State David Scanlan announced on Wednesday the state's primary will take place on Jan. 23, 2024, just eight days after the Iowa caucuses on Jan. 15.
The poll surveyed 1,946 New Hampshire adults and was conducted online Nov. 10-14 by the University of New Hampshire Survey Center. The margin of error for the poll is plus or minus 2.2 percentage points.