Trump 41%, Hillary 39% in latest national Rasmussen poll, 4/28-29, Likely Voters. First time Trump has led the matchup. Trump leads among unaffiliated voters (now the largest group of voters). Hillary only has narrow lead among voters under age 40, traditionally a Democrat group

5/2/16, "Trump 41%, Clinton 39%," Rasmussen Reports

"A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey of Likely U.S. Voters finds Trump with 41% support to Clinton’s 39%. 

Fifteen percent (15%) prefer some other candidate, and five percent (5%) are undecided. (To see survey question wording, click here.)
This is the first time Trump has led the matchup since last October. Clinton held a 41% to 36% advantage in early March. 

Trump now has the support of 73% of Republicans, while 77% of Democrats back Clinton. But Trump picks up 15% of Democrats, while just eight percent (8%) of GOP voters prefer Clinton, given this matchup. Republicans are twice as likely to prefer another candidate. 

Among voters not affiliated with either major party, Trump leads 37% to 31%, but 23% like another candidate. Nine percent (9%) are undecided. 

The survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted on April 27-28, 2016 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology. 

Ninety-one percent (91%) of Democrats now say Clinton is likely to be their party’s nominee. Eighty-nine percent (89%) of Republicans see Trump as the likely GOP nominee.  

Trump leads 48% to 35% among men but trails Clinton by a similar 44% to 34% among women. 

Clinton’s narrow 38% to 32% lead among those under 40, traditionally a reliable Democratic group, suggests that younger voters will be a big target in the upcoming campaigning.

Twenty-five percent (25%) of these voters like another candidate for now, and five percent (5%) are undecided. Trump has a small advantage among older voters. 

Clinton earns 71% of the black vote, 45% support among other minority voters but just 33% of whites. Trump gets only nine percent (9%) of blacks, 33% of other minorities and 48% of white voters. 

Here’s the latest delegate count going into tomorrow’s Indiana primaries. For Bernie Sanders and the #Never Trump forces on the Republican side, Indiana is likely to be their last stand....

Additional information from this survey and a full demographic breakdown are available to Platinum Members only."

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US as of 2015 per Gallup: Democrats 29%, Republicans, 26%, unaffiliated 42%

1/28/16, "At start of campaign, the last gasp of political parties?" McClatchy, David Lightman
 
[Ed. note: Please excuse tiny text. It means google isn't happy with this post. The link to the article still works.]

"The largest party in America now is no party — with the ranks of people calling themselves independents at the highest level in more than 75 years of polling. The parties do not control the message. People learn about politics from social media instead of traditional means such as mailings or campaign rallies. And the parties are no longer the sole banker of politics. Big-money interests now effectively create shadow parties with extensive networks of donors of their own. 

The result: People are tuning out and turning away.

In 2012, average voter turnout for statewide primaries for president, governor and U.S. Senate plunged to its lowest level since the modern primary system became popular in 1972.

“No one likes political parties anymore,” said Jan Leighley, who studies voter behavior at American University, where she is a professor of government. “They no longer have to work through the political process,” added Will Marshall, president of the Progressive Policy Institute.

It’s a historic change in voter behavior. The Democratic and Republican parties have dominated American politics since the mid-1850s. They grew and prospered as inclusive coalitions that tolerated diverse views for the sake of winning elections and then consolidating power....

“Americans’ attachment to the two major political parties in recent years is arguably the weakest Gallup has recorded since the advent of its polls,” Gallup reported in January.

Just 29 percent called themselves Democrats last year (2015), it found, “making it safe to conclude that the current (number) is also the low point in Gallup polling history.” Republican loyalty was only 1 percentage point above its recent low of 25 percent three years ago. The bloc of independents reached 40 percent in 2011, and it has stayed at or above that level ever since.

The parties’ challenge is clear in states of all sizes. In New Hampshire, site of the first primary election, at least 40 percent register as “undeclared,” meaning they have no formal affiliation with a political party.

In 2014, California had twice as many voters without a party affiliation as it did 20 years earlier. The same year, Florida had 47 percent more independent voters than a decade earlier.

Most indifferent to parties: young Americans. Nearly half the millennials identified as independents in 2014, Pew found, more than the combined total of those willing to be called either Democrats or Republicans.

“I never want to write down that I’m a Republican,” said Rebecca Sorensen, a sophomore at Penn State. She leans Republican but is reluctant to openly identify with the party because she supports abortion rights. 

Historically, children adopted their parents’ political views, including identification with the two major parties. Not anymore.

Millennials get information from sources other than from family dinners, neighbors or campaign brochures. If something piques their interest, they turn to Twitter, text messaging, The Skimm and other modern forms of instant communication.

“If I want to know more, I Google it,” said Jayla Akers, a sophomore at Penn State University.

Political parties are seen as too narrowly focused, too interested in keeping incumbents in office.

They gerrymander congressional districts to maximize their chances so that election after election only a handful of House of Representatives races are true contests. Of the House’s 435 seats, 402 incumbents are considered safe bets for re-election this year, said the nonpartisan Rothenberg and Gonzales Political Report....

It’s a far cry from freedom from party or faction that the Founding Fathers envisioned.

“This two-party system quashes independent thought and the courage to take a stance on positions and kills the free market of ideas our country was supposed to be founded on,” said Ellen Read, a political activist in New Hampshire. 

Parties for generations did welcome differing views and broader membership.

“The Republican Party, both in this state and nationally, is a broad party. There is room in our tent for many views,” Ronald Reagan, then governor of California, said in 1967....

Republicans once had a strong bloc of abortion rights supporters, for example, but in 1976 the party formally included in its platform support for a constitutional amendment “to restore protection of the right to life for unborn children.” It’s now unmistakably the anti-abortion party....

Democrats also were critical of their own tactics....“It’s true that today’s multifaceted political landscape changes the footprint of national parties,” said Democratic Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz.
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But she noted that “in the primaries, we set the rules for the nomination and nothing can replace the unique ability of the national parties to effectively organize and mobilize voters,” and their role in the general election is so detailed it “cannot be replicated externally.”

While independents are gaining clout, so are the big-money groups that now operate as virtual political parties.

Take Freedom Partners, an organization sponsored by brothers Charles and David Koch of Wichita, Kan. Last year, the group committed to spend $889 million on politics and policy in 2015 and 2016....

And the Koch network does more than just spend money. Twice each year it hosts about 400 executives, who pay dues of $100,000 each, for meetings on politics and policies....

Other alternatives to the parties also are gearing up. In that world, everyday voters ask, how can they ever be heard? Not through the Republican or Democrats parties, say increasing numbers of voters.

As Peter White, a cabin manager in Nottingham, New Hampshire, put it, “You feel the two parties both work for Wall Street and don’t care who wins.”"　

"This version changes the reference to the rise in independents in California to say voters without a party affiliation."



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