GOP voters divided on Jeb Bush

Republican voters are divided in their support for Jeb Bush in the upcoming 2016 presidential race, according to results from a brand-new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.

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Forty-nine percent of potential GOP primary voters say they could see themselves supporting Bush, the former Florida governor whose father and brother served as president, versus 42% who say they couldn’t back him.

But that’s a better score than some other possible Republican candidates received in the poll:

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• Only 32% of Republican voters said they could see themselves supporting New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, versus 57% who couldn’t (-25);
• Only 20% said they could see themselves backing Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., compared with 51% who couldn’t (-31);
• And only 23% said they could see themselves supporting real-estate mogul Donald Trump, versus 74% who couldn’t (-51).

The numbers for other Republicans who ranked higher on this scale – as well as the numbers for Democrats – will be released on Monday night.

The national NBC/WSJ poll was conducted March 1-5, and the margin of error for the results from 229 Republican primary voters is plus-minus 6.5 percentage points.