Trump ahead of Biden, Haley behind him in YouGov Poll

Voters on both sides of the aisle are closing ranks and rallying around former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden following the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary, a new Yahoo News/YouGov poll found.

According to the survey, Trump is at 79% support among potential Republican primary voters and is leading his last remaining GOP challenger, former UN ambassador Nikki Haley, by 65 percentage points.

Although she finished strong in New Hampshire, Haley currently trails Trump by a wider margin than in December, when she was polling at 19% to the former president’s 70% in a hypothetical one-on-one matchup.

Support for Biden among potential Democrat primary voters has jumped 6 percentage points — from 68% in December to 74% now — while self-help author Marianne Williamson and Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips are garnering 4% and 3% support, respectively.

The desire among voters for alternatives to Trump and Biden is also dwindling, as they accept the very real possibility of a 2020 rematch. Among Republican primary voters, 72% now say they prefer Trump as the 2024 nominee over “someone else;” in December, 55% of voters said the same.

Biden, too, has seen a bump in support, with 62% saying they support the president over someone else — an 11-point gain since December. Less than half, or 42%, of potential Democrat primary voters now say they want another Democrat to challenge Biden for the nomination, down from 50% in December.

Political science experts call this coalescing of support “consolidation,” or the process in which voters increasingly support the primary candidate who looks poised to win the party nomination.

According to the survey, consolidation is currently most noticeable on the Republican side, in the wake of Trump’s sweeping wins in Iowa and New Hampshire.

Trump’s 79% support over Haley’s 14% is 23 points higher than the support he received in December against a full primary field of contenders. Republican primary voters (91%) say they believe Trump will “probably” or “definitely” be the GOP’s nominee, including 59% who say he will definitely win. The poll found that half of Republican primary voters now rate Trump very favorably, which is up from 40% in December, and 84% rate him favorably, up from 77%.

Support for Haley, however, has weakened, with 66% of GOP primary voters saying they want her to “drop out and allow Donald Trump to win the Republican nomination.” Less than three in 30% want her to stay in the race and “keep running.” Just 2% said Haley will probably win the nomination and 1% said she will definitely win it.

The poll was conducted Jan. 25-29 and surveyed 1,594 American adults. It has a margin of error of 2.7 percentage points.