Billionaire Donald Trump leads the GOP field in New Hampshire by a 20-point margin, according to an American Research Group poll released Thursday, while Sens. Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Ohio Gov. John Kasich are locked in a close scrum to claim the second-place spot.
The ARG poll showed support for Trump at 34 percent in New Hampshire, far ahead of the rest of the Republican pack. Rubio took second place at 14 percent, only just ahead of Kasich at 13 percent and Cruz at 12 percent.
This poll shows Trump tied with his 34 percent showing in the same poll last week, keeping him at the high point of an unbroken ascent since a late December ARG poll showed him with a still-sizable lead over the other contenders at 21 percent.
For both Cruz and Rubio, this poll represents an increase from last week’s results, when Cruz stood at 10 percent and Rubio at 11 percent. Kasich, by contrast, has seen a 3-point drop in support since last week, when ARG found him at 16 percent. His support reached a high of 20 percent in mid-January.
The ARG poll was taken from Feb. 2-3 using live phone interviews. Pollsters surveyed 418 likely Republican voters, with a margin of error of 5 percentage points.
