2024 showdowns: Biden tops Trump but trails DeSantis in national poll's potential match ups

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A new national poll suggests Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida topping Democratic President Biden in a hypothetical 2024 presidential election matchup.

However, the same poll suggests that Biden leads former President Trump.

The survey from the Suffolk University and USA Today also indicates that Republican voters would prefer DeSantis over Trump as their standard-bearer in 2024 by double digits.

DeSantis would edge Biden 46.6%-42.7% if both faced off against each other in the 2024 general election, according to the poll, which was conducted Dec. 7-11.

However, Biden tops Trump 47.3%-39.5% in a potential rematch of their 2020 presidential election showdown, the survey of 1,000 registered voters nationwide indicates. Biden's lead is up from four-point margin in Suffolk University survey in October.

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President Biden and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis arrive to tour an area impacted by Hurricane Ian on Wednesday, Oct. 5, 2022, in Fort Myers Beach, Florida. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

While the poll points to Biden's favorable ratings ticking up in recent months — although they are still underwater — support for him seeking a second term has declined from 45% in autumn to 40% now. Among all voters, less than a quarter of those questioned said they wanted to see Biden seek a second term in the White House, with just over two-thirds saying no.

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Former President Trump launched his third White House bid last month with an announcement at his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida. Only a quarter of all respondents wanted Trump to seek the White House again.

Among Republicans, 47% wanted him to run again, down from 60% in July. Forty-five percent of GOP voters do not want him making another presidential bid.

Former President Trump, during an announcement at his Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Florida, Tuesday, Nov. 15, 2022, launches a third campaign for the White House. (Eva Marie Uzcategui/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

DeSantis, who last month won a landslide re-election, tops Trump 56%-33% among Republican voters when asked whom they prefer as the 2024 presidential nominee.

For over a year, DeSantis has routinely discounted talk of a 2024 White House run as he stayed focused on his 2022 gubernatorial re-election. However, he has become a major force in the GOP as he has built a political brand that stretches from coast to coast, and political prognosticators view him as a potential presidential contender.

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The poll indicates that by a two-to-one margin, Republicans and GOP-leaning independents now say they want Trump's policies but a different standard-bearer to lead them in 2024.

"Republicans and conservative independents increasingly want Trumpism without Trump," Suffolk University Political Research Center director David Paleologos said.

Two years after his 2020 election defeat at the hands of Biden, Trump remains the most popular and influential politician in the Republican Party and the clear polling front-runner in the burgeoning 2024 GOP nomination race. 

However, his latest campaign launch was anything but spectacular. Trump's candidacy kick-off event last month at his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida was widely criticized not only by Democrats but also by fellow Republicans.

Some in Trump's political orbit told Fox News the early announcement was intended in part to clear the field of potential rivals and help the former president avoid the growing net of legal entanglements, but it appears to have failed on both accounts.

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Trump also appears to be the victim of self-inflicted wounds, from his heavily criticized dinner at Mar-a-Lago with the antisemitic rapper Ye — formerly known as Kanye West — and White nationalist and Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes to a widely panned social media post which appeared to suggest the "termination" of the U.S. Constitution in order to overturn the 2020 presidential election results.

Additionally, the defeat of Trump-endorsed Herschel Walker to Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock in Georgia's crucial Senate runoff election one week ago was the latest setback of a Republican nominee handpicked and supported by the former president in the midterm elections. Walker's loss followed high-profiles defeats by Pennsylvania’s Mehmet Oz, Arizona’s Kari Lake and Blake Masters, Wisconsin’s Tim Michels, Nevada’s Adam Laxalt and Michigan's Tudor Dixon.

Trump has yet to hold any campaign rallies — unlike during the launch of his successful 2016 presidential campaign. However, aides tell Fox News that is by design and that the former president will increasingly hold public events starting next month.

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"President Trump entered the race three weeks ago ready to win and he is going to do exactly that — no amount of wishful thinking from the media or consultant class will change it," Taylor Budowich, spokesman for the Trump-aligned MAGA Inc. super PAC recently told Fox News. 

Budowich touted that Trump is "building one of the most ruthless and talented teams in American politics, and he is the only person in the country who is ready and capable of reversing America’s decline."