Former President Donald Trump has suffered a blow following a new poll which found some 17 percent of conservative voters will vote for President Joe Biden in the 2024 election.
A new SurveyUSA poll has Trump ahead by one point after he was shot in the ear during a campaign rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday.
The poll found that of the 1,186 registered voters surveyed, 44 percent would vote for Trump, while 43 percent would vote for Biden. The two men had been tied at 44 percent each, according to a previous SurveyUSA poll.
The latest survey was conducted between July 12 and 15. Of the 49 percent of voters polled before Saturday's shooting, 46 percent said they would vote for Biden, while 42 percent said they would vote for Trump.
Meanwhile, Trump lead by five points amongst the 51 percent of voters interviewed after the shooing.
Despite Trump's lead, the poll shows he is failing to win over some conservative voters, with 17 percent saying they would vote for Biden in the 2024 election, compared to 75 percent who said they would vote for Trump.
The data spells out the task at hand for the RNC as they seek to appeal to conservative voters to back Trump in their unity message this week.
Trump is expected to use his first speech since surviving an assassination attempt on Thursday to plead for national unity at the final day of the RNC in Milwaukee.
The former president told the Washington Examiner that he had changed his speech after he was shot in the ear on Saturday, narrowly avoiding death.
"The speech I was going to give on Thursday was going to be a humdinger," he said.
"Had this not happened, this would've been one of the most incredible speeches," aimed mostly at the policies of Biden, he added, according to the newspaper. "Honestly, it's going to be a whole different speech now."
"This is a chance to bring the whole country, even the whole world, together. The speech will be a lot different, a lot different than it would've been two days ago," he added.
Trump arrived in Milwaukee for the first day of the convention on Sunday, one day after he was targeted in an assassination attempt during a campaign rally. He was seen with a bandage on his right ear.
"I'm not supposed to be here, I'm supposed to be dead," he said in an interview with The New York Post.
Recent polls suggest Trump's chances of winning the November election have not increased since the shooting.
A poll conducted by Morning Consult of 2,045 registered voters on Monday revealed that Trump is leading Biden by just one percentage point with 46 percent, compared to the president's 45 percent. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus two percentage points.
The findings also revealed that Trump's lead has narrowed slightly since the firm's previous survey, conducted between July 12 and 14, which put Trump two percentage points ahead with 44 percent to Biden's 42 percent.
In the week before the shooting, national polls had Trump as the favorite to win the White House, leading narrowly in the six key battleground states of Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
However, polls have also suggested that Trump's margin over Biden is narrowing in two key states: Florida and North Carolina.
Trump previously defeated Biden in both states in 2020, while he held a six-point lead over Biden in Florida in a Redfield & Wilton Strategies poll from that June.
However, a Presidential Voting Intention poll of 3,601 swing state voters by Redfield & Wilton Strategies, conducted before the shooting, found Trump only leads Biden by four points in Florida. The poll shows that 45 percent of participants plan to vote for Trump, compared to Biden's 41 percent.
Meanwhile, Trump's margin is also narrowing in North Carolina, where he had a three-point lead over Biden in June. According to Redfield & Wilton Strategies' poll, his lead was slashed to only two points, with 44 percent of those polled saying they would vote for Trump, compared to Biden's 42 percent.
Trump is expected to be confirmed as the official Republican nominee for the 2024 election on the final day on the RNC on Thursday.
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About the writer
Martha McHardy is a U.S. News reporter based in London, U.K. Her focus is on U.S. politics and society. She ... Read more
