Ron Paul in Dead Heat with Barack Obama in 2012 Matchup

Rasmussen Reports unveiled a new poll on Tuesday that found U.S. Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, would be in a statiscal dead heat with President Barack Obama in the general election.

Paul, who is making his second bid for the Republican nomination, took 38 percent of likely voters -- only a whisker behind Obama who had the backing of 39 percent. In a Rasmussen poll released in July, Obama beat Paul 41 percent to 37 percent.

While Obama commanded the loyalty of 78 percent of his Democratic base, only 61 percent of Republicans rallied to Paul. However, Paul had a solid lead over Obama with independents, 43 percent to 33 percent.

Paul was upside down in the poll with 43 percent of voters holding a favorable view of him and 45 percent seeing him unfavorably.

The poll of 1,000 likely voters was taken from Aug. 15-16 and had a margin of error of +/- 3 percent.