Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis now trails Donald Trump by only 9 percentage points in a hypothetical head-to-head matchup for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, as per a new Yahoo News/YouGov poll — the only single-digit gap between the two potential rivals in any major national survey to date.
In a striking sign of vulnerability for the former president — and a possible warning that his vice-like grip on the GOP base is slipping — less than half of registered voters who identify as Republicans or Republican-leaning independents say they would choose Trump (45%) over DeSantis. Another 36% say they would pick DeSantis, while 18% say they’re not sure yet.
Meanwhile President Biden, continues to struggle among registered Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents — less than a third of whom (32%) say they would back him over his own vice president, Kamala Harris (24%), in a theoretical one-on-one contest.
Until recently, the conventional wisdom has been that the 2024 presidential election was taking the shape of a rematch between Biden and Trump. That still may be the likeliest scenario. But as Biden’s popularity continues to sink amid soaring inflation — and as the Jan. 6 select committee sharpens the possibility of criminal charges against Trump — members of both parties have started to whisper about alternatives.