The argument is frequently made that Donald Trump would be a disastrous general election candidate as the Republican nominee. Current polling data does not back this up. Just two public general election polls have been conducted in calendar year 2016, Fox News and NBC/Wall Street Journal, but the average of their results is similar to the RealClearPolitics average of recent polls which include December 2015 surveys.
The 2016 numbers are these:
| Trump vs. Clinton | 44.0 | 47.5 | -3.5 |
| Cruz vs. Clinton | 47.5 | 46.0 | +1.5 |
| Rubio vs. Clinton | 48.0 | 44.0 | +4.0 |
From that you could argue that Rubio is a stronger general election candidate than Cruz, and that both are stronger general election candidates than Trump. Rubio and Cruz win; Trump loses.
But look at the percentages for each of the Republicans and for Clinton. There’s not that much difference. The Republicans range between 44.0-48.0, Clinton between 44.0-47.5. We’re talking about results within the statistical margin of error. All these results look to be roughly consistent with presidential and congressional elections in the two decades between 1994-2014, with the exception of 2006 and 2008, when Democrats were significantly stronger and Republicans significantly weaker.
What’s striking to me is that voters’ current intentions are quite consistent with basic party alignments, despite the analyses that Trump would scramble party lines, despite the claims that Ted Cruz can mobilize the base, despite the argument that Marco Rubio would be a more attractive general election candidate than either. You can use these numbers to support each analysis, claim and argument, but you should recognize that they provide only weak support.
And of course general election pairings at this stage of the contest are not necessarily predictive of the result in November. In the midst of a turbulent nomination contest, most voters seem to be sticking to their longstanding party allegiance — at least for the moment.
