Former President Donald Trump is leading Florida Governor Ron DeSantis by just six points among Republicans, according to a new poll.
The potential 2024 matchup remains hypothetical, as DeSantis has not announced an intent to run for the White House at this time.
The only Republicans who have formally launched campaigns for the primary are Trump and his neoconservative former ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley.
A new Quinnipiac University poll released on Thursday provided likely Republican voters with a list of 14 potential primary candidates. The pollsters found that 42 percent said they would vote for Trump, compared to 36 percent that said they would vote for DeSantis.
None of the other candidates that were presented, including Haley, made it into the double digits.
"Former United Nations Ambassador and South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley receives 5 percent, former Vice President Mike Pence receives 4 percent, and former Secretary of State and CIA Director Mike Pompeo receives 4 percent. No other candidate tops 2 percent of the vote," the pollsters reported.
When the pollsters narrowed the field to the top four candidates, the Republican and Republican-leaning voters were split in a near-dead heat between Trump and DeSantis. In this scenario, Trump received 43 percent support, while DeSantis took 41 percent. Haley received only six percent, and Pence came in last with four percent.
In hypothetical general election polls, both DeSantis and Trump provide a very close challenge to President Joe Biden.
"In a hypothetical general election matchup for president, it is a toss-up between President Biden (48 percent) and former President Trump (46 percent) among all registered voters," the report said. "It is also a toss-up between President Biden and Governor DeSantis with 47 percent of registered voters supporting DeSantis and 46 percent supporting Biden."
The poll also asked voters what their most urgent issue currently is.
"Inflation (29 percent) outranks all other issues as the most urgent issue facing the country today, followed by immigration (13 percent) and gun violence (11 percent)," the pollsters determined. "No other issue reached double digits."
Just three out of 10 Americans said that they are either very satisfied (four percent) or somewhat satisfied (26 percent) with the state of the nation today.
