A new poll is showing Marco Rubio routing two Democratic congressmen as the GOP looks to hold onto a Senate seat in Florida.
Quinnipiac University released a poll on Thursday morning showing Rubio ahead of Patrick Murphy 50 percent to 37 percent. Rubio also leads Alan Grayson 50 percent to 38 percent.
Peter Brown, the assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Poll, noted that Rubio deciding to run for a second term at the last minute, despite promising not to run again, hasn't hurt him.
"Democrats made fun of Sen. Marco Rubio when he opted for a last-minute re-election bid in Florida, but he may be on the way to a last laugh, having quickly opened double digit leads over both Democratic challengers,” Brown said on Thursday.
Rubio is ahead of the Democrats with both men and women. He also is strong with independents, white voters and carries about a third of non-white voters, getting around a third of those surveyed.
"The breadth of Sen. Rubio's lead against Rep. Patrick Murphy, who has the backing of the Democratic leadership, is impressive,” Brown noted. “He has a 19-point margin among independent voters and scores 10 points better among Republicans than Murphy does among Democrats."
Despite his lead over the Democrats, Rubio isn’t get the highest marks from Florida voters. Rubio has the approval of 46 percent of those surveyed while 43 percent disapprove of him.
Businessman Carlos Beruff is also running for the Republican nomination but he does not match up as well with the Democrats as Rubio does. Murphy leads Beruff 40 percent to 34 percent. When Beruff is pitted against Grayson, they each claim 38 percent apiece.
The poll of 1,015 registered Florida voters was taken from June 30-July 11 and had a margin of error of +/- 3.1 percent. One big caveat in the poll’s methodology on party registration. Despite Democrats having the edge in the number of registered voters in the state, 31 percent of those surveyed are from the GOP, 32 percent are independents and 29 percent are Democrats.
