If it's in the News, it's in our Polls. Public opinion polling since 2003.

ARCHIVE

Obama 45%, Santorum 34%

Former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum continues to trail President Obama by double-digits in a hypothetical 2012 presidential election. 

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds Obama earning support from 45% of Likely Voters, while Santorum receives 34% of the vote.  Eleven percent (11%) prefers some other candidate, and another 10% are not sure.  (To see survey question wording, click here.)

The latest findings show little change from July, when the president held a 45% to 31% advantage over Santorum. 

“As with almost all the early 2012 match-up polling, the results say more about President Obama than they do about the Republican challenger,” according to Scott Rasmussen, president of Rasmussen Reports. “Whether it’s Mitt Romney, Rick Perry, Chris Christie, or Rick Santorum as the Republican hopeful, the president’s vote total ends up in the mid-40s.”

Santorum has struggled to garnish as much media attention as his rival GOP hopefuls.  He is stuck in single digits nationally in the Republican primary race.  Among GOP voters in New Hampshire, Santorum earns the lowest amount of support when pitted against his fellow Republican candidates. 

A Generic Republican candidate has now led the president by single digits in weekly polling for nearly three months.  Rasmussen Reports updates that number every Tuesday at 3 pm Eastern. The president’s Job Approval rating is updated daily.

(Want a free daily e-mail update? If it's in the news, it's in our polls).  Rasmussen Reports updates are also available on Twitter or Facebook.

The survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted on October 2-3, 2011 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.

Want to read more?

Become a Rasmussen Reader to read the article

Have an account?

Log In

Become a Reader

Subscribe

Rasmussen Reports is a media company specializing in the collection, publication and distribution of public opinion information.

We conduct public opinion polls on a variety of topics to inform our audience on events in the news and other topics of interest. To ensure editorial control and independence, we pay for the polls ourselves and generate revenue through the sale of subscriptions, sponsorships, and advertising. Nightly polling on politics, business and lifestyle topics provides the content to update the Rasmussen Reports web site many times each day. If it's in the news, it's in our polls. Additionally, the data drives a daily update newsletter and various media outlets across the country.

Some information, including the Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll and commentaries are available for free to the general public. Subscriptions are available for $4.95 a month or 34.95 a year that provide subscribers with exclusive access to more than 20 stories per week on upcoming elections, consumer confidence, and issues that affect us all. For those who are really into the numbers, Platinum Members can review demographic crosstabs and a full history of our data.

To learn more about our methodology, click here.