Trump In; Sanders Scoring

June 18, 2015 — As promised, international businessman Donald Trump, claiming his personal wealth will reach $10 billion, announced his candidacy for the Republican nomination before what he claimed were thousands of people at his palatial Trump Towers in New York City. The media estimated the in-room audience to be less than 1,000. The Trump spokesperson claimed others were listening throughout the building and watching the television presentation on the streets below.

Trump is not expected to be particularly competitive. Consistently, his favorability numbers are the worst of any Republican candidate by a large margin; in some polls his negatives triple his positive rating.

Trump saying that he will be “ … the greatest jobs president that God ever created,” and that he doesn’t “…need anybody’s money. It’s nice. I don’t need anybody’s money. I’m using my own money. I’m not using the lobbyists. I’m not using donors. I don’t care. I’m really rich, I’ll show you that in a second. And by the way, I’m not even saying that in a braggadocio … that’s the kind that’s the kind of thinking you need for this country.”

The new candidate also says he will self-fund his presidential campaign, and certainly has the money to do so. But, will he be a factor in the all-important delegate count? It is highly unlikely. Will he attract attention, and provide us with some needed entertainment during the long and arduous election campaign? Absolutely. Talk as he may, Donald Trump is no threat to win the Republican nomination.

On the Democrat side, two separate polls project Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders to be pulling to within striking distance of Hillary Clinton in neighboring New Hampshire.

Yesterday, Suffolk University released their Granite State poll (June 11-15; 500 likely New Hampshire Democratic primary voters) that gave the former Secretary of State and First Lady only a 41-31 percent lead over the self-proclaimed socialist US senator. A distant third was Vice President Joe Biden, unlikely to become a candidate, with a mere seven percent.

Late last week, the Morning Consult organization publicized their New Hampshire Democratic survey (ongoing survey of 2,000 national respondents, 279 likely NH Democratic voters) that finds Clinton ahead by a similar 44-32-8 percent over Sen. Sanders and the Vice President.

Simply put, this is just a one state story. Clinton’s numbers against Sanders and the rest of the Democratic field are very strong in the other key states – 54-12-9 percent in Iowa (Morning Consult), and 56-15-10 percent in South Carolina (again, Morning Consult) but, this time, Biden is second and Sanders, third. Therefore, little cause for concern exists in the Clinton camp.

Still, when an opponent with some regional name identification is matched with her, said individual even as a fringe candidate, exhibits the potential of doing well. Though Clinton appears to be under no serious threat, at this time, for the party nomination such blips on the political radar do point to some inherent weakness, which will likely come to the forefront during the general election. For now, these New Hampshire polls notwithstanding, Hillary Clinton remains the prohibitive Democratic favorite.

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