Arizona Primary Polls 2016: Democrat And Republican Results Show Stiff Leads For Frontrunners


The 2016 Arizona primary polls are pointing to fairly definitive results for both Republicans and Democrats. Results are likely to tilt in the favor of frontrunners Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton on both sides of the aisle.

Yet for both Democrats and Republicans, the Arizona primary polls have not been as frequent or performed with such large sample sizes as in some other states — which still opens up the possibility of an upset. The state’s most recent 2016 poll on both sides comes from Bruce Merrill and features a group of just 300 surveyed likely voters.

Those numbers, however, paint a fairly stiff divide between Hillary and Donald and their competitors. According to Merrill, Clinton leads by 26 percentage points — she maintains 50 percent of the vote compared to Bernie Sanders’ 24 percent. Still the Arizona primary pollster noted that 26 percent of the Democrats who responded were still undecided — an indicator that some voters are caught between the two candidates.

Another possible sign of life for Bernie in the Arizona primary, Sanders rose in popularity between the Merrill poll and one by MBQF Consulting published February 24. Last month, he trailed Hillary by 34 percentage points — with only 22 percent of the vote compared to her 56 percent. Again, more than 20 percent of voters were undecided.

He’s also significantly up from a Public Policy Polling Arizona primary poll from a year ago, where Clinton led him by 42 percentage points. At that time, Bernie languished in the background at 16 percent — a distant option for the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee. Now he’s much closer to capturing some of the 85 delegates — 10 of which are super delegates — that Arizona holds.

While not accounting for the momentum either campaign may have gained in the last 30 days, the MBQF Arizona primary poll boasted twice the sample size of the more recent one from Merrill. In the end, one poll is more recent and the other more detailed, which makes it difficult to say just how hard the 2016 contest will fall for Hillary — even though she appears slated to win in Arizona.

Arizona Primary Polls 2016 Republican and Democrat results
While the 2016 Arizona Democratic primary could still take another turn, Hillary Clinton is leading in all recent polls. [Photo by Scott Eisen/Getty Images]
For Republicans, Donald is showing a slimmer lead than Clinton is for Democrats. The latest Arizona primary poll shows him with a 12 percentage point advantage over Ted Cruz, though it is notable that the poll’s margin of error is nearly half that — 5.4 percent. Overall, Trump beats Ted 31 percent to 19 percent. John Kasich and Marco Rubio — who had not yet dropped out yet when the Merrill poll was taken — both snagged 10 percent of the vote.

Focusing on the Merrill poll, that leaves 30 percent of Republicans who had not yet decided who to vote for in the 2016 Arizona primary. Additionally, Marco’s 10-percent slice will be redistributed to his former rivals. That leaves 40 percent of the vote still up for grabs, but Cruz will have to capture a substantial portion of it to get anything out of the deal — all 58 of the Arizona delegates are winner-take-all.

A separate primary poll from MBQF also revealed similar results, with Donald taking 37 percent of the vote. Not only did it call the 2016 Republican Arizona contest for Donald, but this time at a 14-point lead over Cruz, coming in at 23 percent. Another 10 percent of voters were undecided and nearly 12 percent had pledged support for Rubio.

Even with this large cut of unknown voters, many pundits have felt comfortable calling Arizona for Trump based on the March 8 MBQF primary poll. Interestingly, if Donald Trump went up against Hillary Clinton in the 2016 general election, one Arizona State University study thinks that they would come in near a dead heat, with 38 percent of the vote each. In that same set of data, Bernie Sanders would beat him 39 percent to 36 percent, previously reported Inquisitr.

This state Arizona Primary Polls 2016 Republican and Democrat results
Donald Trump appears to have successfully landed the 2016 Arizona primary, but polls show some voters who still haven’t made up their minds. [Photo by Ralph Freso/Getty Images]
Will the 2016 Arizona primary polls see an upset in the final results for Democrats and Republicans? You can also check out Inquistr‘s analysis of Tuesday’s Utah primary and Idaho Democratic caucus polls.

[Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images]

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