Just days before the second Republican debate, a new poll is setting the stage for a duel of Washington outsiders, with Donald Trump and Dr. Ben Carson dominating yet another poll.
The two candidates captured more than half of all Republican votes in the latest Washington Post/ABC News poll, with Trump earning 33% of voters who leaned Republican and Carson earning 20% of the votes, more than doubling the standing of the next runner-up, former Gov. Jeb Bush, who earned 8% of the vote.
The political outsiders’ dominance of the poll shouldn’t surprise anyone: 72% of voters say “most people in politics” cannot be trusted, and 64% said the current political system is dysfunctional.
RELATED: US majority: Trump is ‘not the kind of leader’ we need
It wasn’t all good news for front-runner Trump, though: in the survey, a strong majority of voters said the billionaire businessman isn’t qualified to do the job, isn’t honest, doesn’t have the personality or temperament to serve effectively as president, and didn’t understand problems of the voters.
On the left, 42% of voters said they’d support Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination and 24% of voters said they’d support Bernie Sanders. As rumors swirl that he might throw his hat into the ring, Vice President Joe Biden earned 21% of the voters who lean Democratic. If Biden doesn’t get into the race, the survey found 56% of his supporters would support Clinton and 28% will support Sanders.
Jane Timm