Poll: Walker tops GOP, Hillary leads in general

With the dust settling after CPAC, it appears Scott Walker is still maintaining the lead among GOP primary voters with Jeb Bush a few points behind. On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton is still crushing her closest potential opponents and leading all potential Republicans in a general election head-to-head matchup.

Report from Quinnipiac:

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, with 18 percent, and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush with 16 percent, top the list of possible 2016 presidential nominees among Republican or Republican leaning voters nationwide, according to a Quinnipiac University national poll released today.

New Jersey Gov. Christopher Christie and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee are at 8 percent each, the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe-ack) University Poll finds. Physician Ben Carson has 7 percent, with 6 percent each for U.S. Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky and U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas and 5 percent for U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida. No other Republican contender tops 2 percent. Another 17 percent are undecided.

If Walker does not run, Bush gets 18 percent, with 10 percent for Carson, 9 percent each for Christie and Huckabee, 8 percent each for Cruz and Paul and 7 percent for Rubio.

If Bush is out of the race, Walker gets 20 percent, with 10 percent for Christie, 9 percent for Huckabee and 8 percent each for Carson and Rubio.

The scenarios of who runs or doesn’t run is interesting. It appears Jeb Bush and Scott Walker are sharing a lot of the same voters with each one winning out if the other were to drop.

Here is the breakdown of Hillary versus the entire GOP field:

45 – 42 percent over Bush;
46 – 39 percent over Christie;
47 – 41 percent over Paul;
47 – 40 percent over Huckabee;
46 – 41 percent over Rubio;
48 – 39 percent over Walker;
48 – 38 percent over Cruz.

At this point, it feels like this is pretty shallow support on both sides. The numbers don’t change much regardless of which Republican is on the other side opposing Hillary.