WARREN, Mich. — Donald Trump holds a solid lead in two new polls of Michigan Republicans on the eve of a primary that has often played a key role in GOP presidential races. In one survey, by CBS News, Trump is at 39 percent, versus 24 percent for Ted Cruz, 16 percent for Marco Rubio, and 15 percent for John Kasich. In another, by NBC News and the Wall Street Journal, Trump is at 41 percent, versus 22 percent for Cruz, 17 percent for Rubio and 13 percent for Kasich. NBC found Trump leading among men and women, Republicans and independents, conservatives and moderates. And 61 percent of likely GOP voters said they strongly support their candidate, while just 12 percent said they are likely to change their mind.
The Michigan Republican contest is an open primary, meaning the Republicans, independents, and even some Democrats who have made up Trump's support in other states will be free to cast ballots. But on Trump's only day of campaigning here, last Friday, the majority of Michiganders who came to see him were Republican voters, many of them longtime Republican voters. They go way back with the GOP, and they seemed to have particularly intense feelings about their party, its officials, and the conservative thought leaders who they see as trying to destroy Trump's candidacy. The short version is, they've had it with the whole bunch.
Trump appeared at Macomb Community College, in Macomb County, home of the storied Democratic voters who helped put Ronald Reagan in the White House in the 1980s. Trump took the stage just 12 hours after a contentious Republican debate in Detroit, and after 2012 Republican nominee Mitt Romney attacked Trump in a widely-discussed speech.
