National Poll: Clinton Surges To Double-Digit Lead

In the first national survey conducted after audio surfaced of GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump making sexually aggressive comments about women, Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton now leads the business mogul by double digits.

On Oct. 10, a new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll found that Clinton currently leads Trump by 11 percentage points in a four-way race, NBC News reports.

Clinton has surged to the head of the pack with 46 percent while Trump is far behind with only 35 percent support. Libertarian nominee Gary Johnson garnered 9 percent while Green Party nominee Jill Stein arrived in last place with only 2 percent support.

If Johnson and Stein were removed from the equation, the survey found that Clinton currently leads Trump by 14 percentage points. The Democratic nominee would garner 52 percent support in a head-to-head matchup while Trump currently polls at 38 percent support.

The survey also found that 49 percent of likely voters would prefer Democratic lawmakers controlling Congress, while only 42 percent sided with GOP lawmakers. That could spell trouble for Republicans as they campaign to preserve their majority in Congress.

The new poll arrives days after audio surfaced of Trump making lewd comments about women. Caught on a hot microphone in 2005, the business mogul had bragged about using his celebrity to make sexual advances on women during a bus ride with Billy Bush of “Access Hollywood.”

“You know I’m automatically attracted to beautiful — I just start kissing them,” Trump told Bush in private conversation, according to The Washington Post.

“It’s like a magnet … I don’t even wait,” Trump continued. “And when you’re a star, they let you do it … Grab them by the p***y. You can do anything.”

Trump had also recounted his attempt to seduce a married woman, stating, “I moved on her like a b**ch, but I couldn’t get there.”

Following the audio leak, Trump issued a statement apologizing for the remarks, adding, “This was locker-room banter, a private conversation that took place many years ago.”

Polling indicates that likely voters will not let the leaked audio slide with just an apology. Of those asked, 52 percent said that the audiotape should be a campaign issue while only 42 percent believe that it is irrelevant.

Among self-identifying Republicans, 9 percent said that Republican lawmakers should rescind their endorsements for Trump while 14 percent called for the business mogul to step down from the ticket. And 41 percent of overall voters deemed the comments “completely unacceptable.”

FiveThirtyEight, the polling website spearheaded by statistician Nate Silver, projects that Clinton would have an 87.7 percent chance of victory if the election were held today. Meanwhile, they only projected Trump to have a 12.3 percent shot at the White House.

It is unclear if Trump can recover from this scandal. What is clear is that the business mogul’s comments have already had a dramatic effect on the presidential race.

Sources: FiveThirtyEight, NBC News, The Washington Post / Photo credit: Gage Skidmore/Flickr