Hillary Clinton's chances of becoming president suffered a double blow as a new national poll put her in a dead heat with Donald Trump, and large numbers of Bernie Sanders supporters indicated they would switch to the Republican billionaire.
A Reuters/Ipsos survey put Mrs Clinton on 41 per cent to Mr Trump's 40 per cent, a statistical tie, and showed a huge surge in support for the property mogul who was 13 points behind in the same regular poll a week earlier.
Following Tuesday's Democratic primary in West Virginia exit polls showed 39 per cent of those who voted for Mr Sanders, a self-declared socialist, would back Mr Trump in a general election contest between him and Mrs Clinton.
That sounded further alarm bells for Mrs Clinton after she had lost West Virginia by a wide margin.
She was unable to excite struggling white working class voters there who flocked to Mr Sanders.
Mr Trump said many of those same people would "cross over" to him in November, in West Virginia and in key"rust belt" states like Ohio and Pennsylvania.
He added: "I don't want to hit Crazy Bernie Sanders too hard because I love watching what he is doing to Crooked Hillary."
Reince Priebus, the Republican National Committee chairman, said: "It's nothing short of embarrassing that Hillary Clinton has now been defeated twenty times by a 74-year old socialist."
Mr Priebus and House Speaker Paul Ryan, the most senior elected Republican, were due to meet with Mr Trump, the party's presumptive presidential nominee, in Washington today (THURSDAY) for a clear the air summit.
The meeting came after Mr Ryan indicated he was "not ready" to endorse Mr Trump. On Wednesday Mr Ryan said he "wanted to be part of the unifying process".
Mr Sanders said working people were "hurting" and was going to "fight for every last vote."
However, with only eight states still to vote he has no realistic chance of catching Mrs Clinton.
She was further undermined as Vice President Joe Biden suggested he "would have been the best president".
No comments:
Post a Comment