New polls: Cruz, Trump battle for Iowa lead

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Iowa State University’s Dianne Bystrom said voters “are still attracted to Donald Trump’s ‘tough talk, ‘” and “they are seemingly less likely to favor the soft-spoken Dr. Ben Carson”. Marco Rubio, is struggling to gain traction in Iowa, home to the first-in-nation caucuses, The Hill reports.

Cruz responded to one reporter when asked if he thought that Donald Trump would target him now that he had pulled into the lead in Iowa.

Former neurosurgeon Ben Carson, who led by a 14-point margin over Trump in the same poll a month ago, has dropped into fourth place. Cruz also has the advantage in that he is despised by the GOP establishment in Washington; that’s a victor with many GOP voters.

It also said that Cruz and Trump had both gained ground since then.

The survey of 425 likely Republican voters found that 24 percent support Cruz, compared to 19 percent for Trump; the real estate magnate sits just two percentage points ahead of Florida Sen.

Because Christie’s in third place, here are three positive and three negative takeaways from the poll you can use, should you find yourself talking politics at an upcoming holiday party.

The CNN/ORC poll has Trump up by 13% with 33%.

In October, CNN put Carson on top in Iowa with 32 percent.

Dole, the party’s 1996 Republican presidential nominee, said in an interview with MSNBC that former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who’s been polling consistently in the single digits, is the “most qualified” to be president.

Trump is seen as the clear favorite, with 59 percent of New Hampshire Republicans saying they think he will win the primary. Trump is second among Evangelicals with 18 percent of the vote. His favorability rating fell from 84 percent to 64 in that span.

“I recognize that a great many folks in the media would prefer that anyone running for president engage as an ongoing theater critic, criticizing the proposals of others”, Cruz said.

He knows – and I’m guessing he’s been reminded repeatedly during the last few days – that if his rivals back out on that pledge, so can Trump. Cruz, meanwhile, has been enjoying a rapid rise in the polls.

Strengths: Like Trump, Cruz wasn’t thought at first to be in a position to win the nomination.

“Of course, we prosecute deeds and not words”, she said at a press conference Monday to announce an unrelated civil rights investigation into the Chicago Police Department. It’s been a parade of hateful comments about Latinos, Muslims and Black Lives Matter.

Speaking to a Muslim Advocates dinner in Arlington, Va., Lynch affirmed that “this is a country that is based upon free speech”.

What are those winds telling us? In the wake of the California massacre, that trend may continue. These are valedictorians, future teachers and doctors, many of whom don’t even remember living anywhere other than the United States.