POLL: Trump Most Liberal Republican Candidate in More Than 20 Years

By Susan Wright | 9:30 AM on October 04, 2016

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For anyone who has been paying attention and knows the difference, no shocker here.

A recent Gallup survey confirmed that Donald Trump is the most liberal Republican candidate to run for the presidency in over 20 years.

Only 47% of those polled believe Trump to be a conservative. Another 22% saw him as a moderate (read: squish), and 19% call him a liberal.

I can only imagine that the other 12% had some other name for him.

Closet Democrat, perhaps?

Given his stated support for touchback amnesty, single payer healthcare, a progressive tax on wealth, support for the LGBT agenda, gun control, and his expressed admiration for the “good work” of Planned Parenthood, I have to question the judgment of the 47% who still consider him a conservative. It seems pretty obvious that they don’t really grasp the concept, themselves.

That may be the problem.

When 47% of Americans polled can’t tell the difference between free market conservatism and whatever it is that Trump is peddling, it begins to clear the muddy waters, in regards to how we ended up with liberals at the top of both presidential tickets.

By contrast with Trump’s numbers, according to the Hill:

Sixty percent felt Mitt Romney, the 2012 GOP presidential nominee, was conservative, contrasted by 21 percent who said moderate and 11 percent who said liberal.

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), the party’s standard-bearer in 2008, was seen as conservative by 62 percent. Twenty-six percent described McCain as a moderate, while 9 percent said the Arizona lawmaker was liberal instead.

Former President George W. Bush was rated conservative by 68 percent in 2004, meanwhile, while 18 percent said he was moderate and 8 percent liberal.

Finally, former President George H.W. Bush was seen as conservative by 59 percent in 1992. Twenty percent called him moderate and 9 percent said liberal.

Just looking over the numbers, the only set I question would be John McCain’s. He’s definitely more centrist-to-left.

Given the choice, I’d still choose him over Trump, and that’s saying a lot.