Romney 42%, Santorum 24% as Santorum Exits
April 11, 2012
Mitt Romney is the choice of 42% of national GOP voters, and Rick Santorum, as he suspends his campaign, of 24%. Romney's support is among the lowest for the leader after a party's presidential nomination has been effectively settled.
The results are based on April 4-9 Gallup Daily tracking interviews with 1,149 Republicans and Republican-leaning independents who are registered to vote. Gallup has tracked Republican voters' nomination preferences daily since December and periodically since September 2010.
Romney Support Historically Low for Winning Candidate
A candidate's share of the vote in nomination preference polls partly depends on the number of challengers in the race and the strength of those challengers, so it is not a definitive measure of candidate appeal, but it does give an indication of it. Additionally, a candidate's support depends to some degree on the timing of Gallup's decision to cease measuring preferences for a party's presidential nomination, which usually occurs when a nominee is all but certain.
Romney's 42% support in the final 2012 nomination preference poll ranks among the lowest Gallup has measured for a nominee in its final poll since 1972, when the McGovern-Fraser reforms shifted power for choosing the nominee to voters in primaries and caucuses rather than party leaders at the national conventions.
Specifically, no other Republican winner in the primary era has had as little as 42% support in Gallup's final measure of nomination preferences, with George W. Bush's 57% in 2000 the lowest before now.
Across both parties, only George McGovern had less support among a winner in either party, being the preferred nominee of 30% of Democrats just before the 1972 Democratic convention. Jimmy Carter, who was supported by 48% of Democrats in 1980 as he sought re-election, is the only other nominee who was below 50% support in the final nomination preference poll.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/153839/Romney-Santorum-Santorum-Exits.aspx
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