Story highlights
Utah voters who identify as Republicans back Trump over McMullin 56% to 34%.
Yet McMullin is not even leading among Mormons in the survey: Trump edges him out 43% to 37%.
Evan McMullin sits a full 13 points behind Donald Trump in the surprising 2016 battleground of Utah, according to a new poll.
McMullin has led or tied with Trump in some public surveys there in recent weeks, which if realized would make him the first third-party candidate to win a state since 1968. McMullin notches just 24% in the new survey from Monmouth University on Thursday, 7 percentage points behind Hillary Clinton at 31% and double digits behind Trump at 37%.
McMullin, a former Republican aide and CIA operative mounting a #NeverTrump independent challenge, is Mormon and a Utah native. He seems to have found a foothold in one of the most Republican states in the country, a sign of Trump’s trouble with conservative voters and especially with Mormons.
Utah voters who identify as Republicans back Trump over McMullin 56% to 34%, according to the poll. Yet McMullin is not even leading among Mormons in the survey: Trump edges him out 43% to 37%.
Despite the tight polls, neither the Clinton nor Trump campaigns have significantly invested in the state – visits by members of their ticket have been few, and neither has aired advertisements there.
The poll was fielded from October 30 to November 2 and surveyed 402 likely voters for a margin of error of 4.9 percentage points.