Poll: Clinton holds commanding lead for 2016

Hillary Rodham Clinton holds a commanding 6-to-1 lead over other Democrats heading into the 2016 presidential campaign, while the GOP field is deeply divided with no clear front-runner, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

Clinton trounces her potential primary rivals with 73 percent of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents, reinforcing a narrative of inevitability around her nomination if she runs. Vice President Biden is second, with 12 percent, and Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts is third, with 8 percent.

Although Clinton's favorability rating has fallen since she stepped down as secretary of state a year ago, she has broad Democratic support across ideological, gender, ethnic and class lines. Her lead is the largest recorded in an early primary matchup in at least 30 years of Post-ABC polling.

The race for the Republican nomination, in contrast, is wide open, with six prospective candidates registering 10 percent to 20 percent support. No candidate has broad backing from both tea-party activists and mainline Republicans, signaling potential fissures when the GOP picks a standard-bearer in 2016.

New Jersey Gov. Christie, who was at or near the top of the Republican field in many public opinion surveys last year, appears to have suffered politically from the bridge traffic scandal engulfing his administration.

The new survey puts Christie in third place - with the support of 13 percent of Republicans and GOP-leaning independents - behind Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, with 20 percent, and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, at 18 percent. The rest of the pack includes Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas, Rand Paul of Kentucky and Marco Rubio of Florida, who are at 12 percent, 11 percent and 10 percent, respectively.

Among strong backers of the tea party - who make up about one in five of the Republicans polled - Cruz has a big lead, with 28 percent, followed by Ryan, at 18 percent. But Cruz, an iconoclastic freshman senator who rose to prominence during last fall's partial government shutdown, registers just 4 percent among those who oppose or have no opinion of the tea party.

Christie is weakest among the strong tea party set, winning 6 percent of that group, but he has the backing of 15 percent of other Republicans. Bush's base of support comes from self-identified Republicans, while Ryan's strength comes from white evangelical Protestants, young voters and less conservative wings of the party. Rubio does particularly well among Republicans with college degrees.

Christie has benefited from the perception that he has unique appeal among independents and some Democrats, a reputation the governor burnished with his 2013 reelection in his strongly Democratic state.

But that image has been tarnished, the survey finds. More Democrats now view Christie unfavorably than favorably, with independents divided. Republicans, meanwhile, have a lukewarm opinion, with 43 percent viewing him favorably and 33 percent unfavorably. Overall, 35 percent of Americans see him favorably and 40 percent unfavorably.

Among the public, 46 percent say they consider the George Washington Bridge episode a "sign of broader problems" with Christie's leadership, while 43 percent say they think it was an "isolated incident."

Most Republicans give Christie the benefit of the doubt, with 57 percent saying the bridge incident is isolated. Sixty percent of Democrats say it is indicative of broader problems, while independents are almost evenly split.

The 2016 presidential campaign is not likely to start taking shape until the end of this year, when candidates are expected to begin declaring their intentions. Among the Republicans, Ryan and Bush appear to be the most ambivalent about a campaign. Other Republicans not named in the poll, such as Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, could gain steam as potential candidates.

In a theoretical head-to-head general election match-up, Clinton leads Christie among registered voters, 53 percent to 41 percent. This is a far larger deficit than Republicans had in the popular vote in the last two presidential elections. In 2012, President Obama beat Mitt Romney 51 percent to 47 percent, and he beat John McCain 53 percent to 46 percent in 2008.

The Post-ABC poll was conducted Jan. 20-23 among a random national sample of 1,003 adults, including interviews on landlines and with cellphone-only respondents. The overall margin of sampling error is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.