A new CNN/ORC International Poll released today confirms the results of last week’s Gallup survey: Rick Perry has jumped way ahead of the rest of the Republican presidential field. Republicans and GOP-leaning independents gave the Texas governor a 27-14 percent lead over Mitt Romney in a questionnaire that included Sarah Palin and Rudy Giuliani as choices. When those two non-candidates were eliminated, Perry’s advantage increased to 32-18 percent.
The most interesting piece of intelligence from the breakdown of the survey was that Perry had an overwhelming advantage among those who counted themselves as supporters of the Tea Party, with 37 percent of that group backing him to only 11 percent for Romney. Even more significant is Perry had an edge even among those who considered themselves neutral about the Tea Party, leading Romney 18-16 percent. This means that within only a couple of weeks of his campaign launch, Perry is not only the choice of conservatives but is competitive with GOP moderates.
Obviously, this is bad news for Romney. His default position as frontrunner against the likes of Michele Bachmann and Tim Pawlenty through the spring and summer is officially over. It is worse news for Bachmann, whose brief stay in the first tier is also finished. That the woman who was the leading advocate of the Tea Party in Congress during the last two years trails Perry by a shocking margin of 37-14 among those who identify with that group says all we need to know about who is at this moment the overwhelming choice of conservatives. Even if Bachmann shines at the upcoming debates, Perry will have to falter badly for her to make up so much ground.
As for the rest of the field, it is also no longer in doubt that every other GOP candidate is more or less running for symbolic or personal reasons. While men like Rick Santorum or Herman Cain could never have been said to have a reasonable chance of winning, that is not the case for Jon Huntsman, whom many in the media believed to be a serious contender when he announced. That the well-funded Huntsman is registering only one percent in this poll and trailing even former New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson–who gets two percent but has not even been invited to take part in the upcoming debates–must be considered quite an accomplishment. When you take into account the fact Huntsman, Cain, Santorum and Johnson are all registering support that is less than the three percent margin of error in this poll, perhaps we should stop worrying about how much coverage marginal candidates like Ron Paul (six percent support) get and wonder why anyone bothers to note Huntsman is still wandering the country pretending to be a serious candidate.
