Texas Sen. Ted Cruz is beating GOP presidential rival Donald Trump in the Lone State State ahead of next week's Super Tuesday primary voting, a new poll shows.
The University of Texas and Texas Tribune survey released Tuesday shows Cruz with an 8-point lead.
Here's the breakdown:
- Cruz: 37 percent
- Trump: 29 percent
- Florida Sen. Marco Rubio: 15 percent
- Jeb Bush: 6 percent
- Ohio Gov. John Kasich: 5 percent
- Retired pediatric neurosurgeon Ben Carson: 4 percent.
The survey's margin of error is 3.49 percentage points.
"These numbers reflect what most of us think was going on in Texas: It's decent ground for Donald Trump because he's a national candidate who's touched a nerve everywhere, but it displays a little bit of a homefield advantage for Ted Cruz," Daron Shaw, co-director of the poll and a professor of government at the University of Texas at Austin, tells the
Texas Tribune.
Shaw said the poll was completed on the eve of the South Carolina primary and its outcome — and Jeb Bush's decision to drop out — could change the dynamics in Texas.
"There was no redemption in Texas for Jeb Bush, even before South Carolina," added Jim Henson, director of the Texas Politics Project at UT-Austin and the poll's co-director.