Donald Trump is beating all four of the highest-polling Democratic 2020 presidential nominees in Wisconsin, a key swing state whose 10 electoral votes could be the tipping point for the election, The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports. Support for Trump’s impeachment is also slipping among voters in the Badger State.
The latest Marquette University Law School Poll, which polled 801 likely voters between November 13 and 17, found that Trump would easily beat any of the four Democratic presidential contenders who are likely, based on current polling, to challenge him at the ballot box in 2020.
Specifically, Trump is leading Joe Biden by three points, 47 percent to 44 percent. By comparison, back in August, Biden was leading Trump nearly by double digits in Wisconsin, 51 percent to 42 percent. Against Bernie Sanders , Trump leads 48 percent to 45 percent; against Elizabeth Warren, he leads 48 percent to 43 percent.
Trump has his biggest advantage against South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg: against him, Trump leads 47 percent to 39 percent.
Marquette Poll director Charles Franklin notes that these numbers reveal a “small advantage” for Donald Trump. What’s more, the three-point leads that Trump holds over Biden and Sanders are within the poll’s margin of error.
Franklin suggests that the impeachment process played a role in moving the needle.
“Republicans have moved 2 or 3 or 4 points in the president’s direction, whether it’s on vote preference or support for him over impeachment. Democrats have become just a little bit, again 2, 3, 4 points less opposed to the president whether it’s on impeachment or on vote” preference, Franklin said.
As for impeachment, it seems that Wisconsonites’ enthusiasm for the process is also slipping since public hearings on Capitol Hill began.
Specifically, back in October, a similar poll in Wisconsin revealed that 44 percent of voters believed that the president should be impeached and removed from office, while 51 percent said he should not be. Now that public testimony has begun, it appears that the voters have soured somewhat on impeachment: the latest poll shows that 40 percent of Wisconsin registered voters now believe Trump should be impeached and removed from office, while 53 percent disagree.
Wisconsin can make or break an election, as Hillary Clinton learned the hard way in 2016. Clinton was expected to win the state’s coveted 10 electoral votes, but in an unexpected turn of events, Trump won the state’s votes by 0.77 percent, or about 23,000 votes out of nearly 3 million cast. When Wisconsin was announced as having gone to Trump on Election Night 2016, those 10 votes were the final ones needed to bring Trump’s electoral vote total to 270, giving him the election.
