Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said Wednesday that people paid more attention to a recent poll that showed him trailing retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson than a separate poll that showed him well ahead, but vowed to press through an “unfair playing field” to the Feb. 1 Iowa caucuses.
Mr. Carson has moved ahead of Mr. Trump both nationally and in the early state of Iowa in the latest RealClearPolitics average on the 2016 GOP field, though Mr. Trump still retains double-digits leads in the early states of New Hampshire and South Carolina.
Mr. Trump said he’s done very well in polls and said that people chose to put more an emphasis on a recent CBS poll showing him slightly behind than a Washington Post-ABC News poll that showed him well ahead.
“Everybody thought it was bigger than the Benghazi story with Hillary Clinton — it was amazing,” he said on CNN’s “New Day.” “I said, ’Well, what about the ABC-Washington Post poll?’ They said, ’Oh, well we didn’t see that one.’ “
“So you know, I think it’s a pretty unfair playing field, but that’s OK, [because] ABC-Washington Post was a great poll for me. It came out just about at the same time as CBS, and you know, it’s an incredible thing,” Mr. Trump said.
“But I think I’m doing really well in New Hampshire. We’re doing really well,” he said. “You saw yesterday we took the lead back in Iowa. We have a huge lead in Florida, huge lead in South Carolina.”
“So, you know, we continue to go on,” he said. “Look, the bottom line is it starts on February 1st, so everybody will see what happens on February 1st, but, you know, I’m getting the biggest crowds by far.”
• David Sherfinski can be reached at dsherfinski@washingtontimes.com.
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