Six Takeaways from Fox Poll

Donald Trump is leading Hillary Clinton, a new Fox News Channel poll released Wednesday shows — but that finding might not even be the most significant number in the survey.

The #NeverTrump movement seems to have collapsed.

The bottom line, of course, will generate the most attention. It is one of only a handful of polls this year to give Trump a lead over Clinton in a hypothetical matchup, and the first Fox survey to do so since the beginning of January.

But the result is still within the margin of error, and with the election still half a year away, it is hardly determinative. Here are six insights from the poll that could prove more meaningful in the long run:

The #NeverTrump movement seems to have collapsed. Perhaps surprisingly, given the depth of his unpopularity, there seems to be little appetite for a third option. Only 3 percent of respondents volunteered that they would vote for someone else, with another 6 percent saying they would not vote. That is not a strong base from which to launch an independent candidacy. The number would likely be higher if respondents were given a well-known candidate instead of forcing them to volunteer an unspecified choice, but efforts to recruit such a candidate are fizzling. On Wednesday, former Sen. Tom Coburn formally took himself out of consideration, and 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney said he was giving up efforts for find a candidate.

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Libertarian Gary Johnson posts a respectable number. The former New Mexico governor is not well-known and won only about 1 percent of the vote as the Libertarian Party’s standard-bearer in 2012. But he rated the choice of 10 percent of voters when pollsters included his name in the horse race question. Some in the #NeverTrump camp have suggested a simpler route to oppose the presumptive nominee would be to embrace Johnson, and this result is likely to encourage that strategy. Interestingly, though, Johnson appears to siphon support equally from Trump and Clinton. In a three-way matchup, Trump still leads by 3 points — 42 percent to 39 percent. Perhaps that reflects those supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders who care more about legal marijuana than free college?

Both candidates are stunningly unpopular. A Clinton-Trump matchup is shaping up to be a contest between the two most unpopular major-party nominees in history. Trump’s unfavorable number, 56 percent, would be an unmitigated disaster except for two things: It represents a 9-point improvement from the last Fox poll in March, and Clinton is even more unpopular. Some 61 percent of poll respondents view her unfavorably. It sets up the possibility that the country might elect a president whom a majority of voters view unfavorably.

Strength, but mostly weaknesses. The polls suggests Trump and Clinton share many of the same weaknesses. A majority views both as dishonest and untrustworthy, believe both are not reliable leaders and believe both will say anything to get elected. Trump’s one strength among voters is that 59 percent view him as a strong leader. People are split on their views of Clinton on that question.

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The electorate breaks down in familiar patterns. For all the talk how this election could scramble long-held assumptions about voting patterns, the subgroup data from the poll look an awful lot like Generic Republican vs. Generic Democrat. There is a gender gap, with men favoring Trump and women backing Clinton. Younger voters favor Clinton by 11 points. Clinton’s support among black voters, 90 percent, is in line with the historical average for Democrats in national elections. Despite concerns that Trump’s sharp immigration rhetoric would massively turn off Latinos, his support among Hispanics — 23 percent — is only 4 points behind how Romney performed in 2012. One sector where patterns could be upended is education: Trump performed better than Romney with voters who don’t have college degrees, and worse among the college-educated.

The Democratic favorability advantage over Republicans is due almost entirely to Republicans. The poll indicated that the Democratic Party enjoys a 7-point favorability advantage over the Republican Party among the public. But it is not because the GOP is alienating independents, who hold both parties in roughly similar regard. The difference comes from rank-and-file party members. Nine in 10 Democrats view their party favorably, while almost a quarter of Republican view their own party unfavorably.