Last week’s Fox News poll was called an outlier by many, but now a new national Washington Post poll released this morning shows that Trump has a slight lead over Hillary Clinton. The top line result of the poll is that Trump leads Clinton 46-44. However, as the Washington Examiner notes, it takes the Post several paragraphs to get there because the main focus of their write up of the poll is that everyone hates both of the major candidates.

Never in the history of the Post-ABC poll have the two major party nominees been viewed as harshly as Clinton and Trump.

Nearly 6 in 10 registered voters say they have negative impressions of both major candidates. Overall, Clinton’s net negative rating among registered voters is minus-16, while Trump’s is
minus-17, though Trump’s numbers have improved since March. Among all adults, Trump’s net negatives are significantly higher than those of Clinton.

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Among those registered voters who say they favor Clinton, 48 percent say their vote is in support of the candidate while an identical percentage say their vote is mainly to oppose Trump. Among Trump’s backers, 44 percent say they are casting an affirmative vote for the Republican, while 53 percent say their motivation is to oppose Clinton.

Support for the two candidates as they begin their direct engagement appears tepid. Less than half of those in Clinton’s column say they strongly support her, while a bare majority say they support her “somewhat.” The numbers for Trump are virtually identical.

Nor are people fully satisfied with their choice of major party nominees — 51 percent call themselves satisfied while 44 percent say they want a third-party option.

One way or another, this election is going to be ugly, nasty, and negative on an unprecedented scale.