Would it be easier for a consolidated GOP field to beat Trump?

(NewsNation) — Former president Donald Trump’s sizable lead in most Republican primary polls has many thinking his victory is a foregone conclusion.

But those polls are largely reflective of a field that is divided among several candidates — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum and former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson remain in the race less than two months before primary season begins — challenging Trump.

Would things be different if just one of those candidates were left standing against Trump as Republican voters start participating in caucuses and primaries beginning in January?

There are some indications that consolidation could harm Trump. In early October, WPA Intelligence and the nonpartisan election reform advocacy group FairVote conducted a survey of voters in the states that vote before Super Tuesday.

Unlike most polls of voters, this one was conducted with ranked-choice voting, where voters ranked their candidates according to their preferences instead of choosing just one.

In an election that uses ranked-choice voting, if a majority picks a certain candidate as their first choice, that candidate wins. But if no candidate gets a majority, then the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated. Then voters’ second choices are taken into account and the process repeats itself until someone wins a majority. (This style of voting is becoming increasingly popular at the local level).

What they found was that Trump was the first-choice candidate for 43% of voters in those early states, but when voters were allowed to rank candidates, DeSantis won, 51% to Trump’s 49%.

But with the exception of the Virgin Islands, no GOP primaries or caucuses are expected to use ranked-choice voting for their contests. That means that a divided field still serves to benefit Trump immensely — yet consolidation could still pose a threat to him.

“Trump’s huge lead among first choices means that it would be an uphill battle, at this point, to consolidate around another candidate,” conceded FairVote Director of Research and Policy Deb Otis, “but it’s not impossible. This poll shows that a lot of voters for the non-Trump candidates continue to prefer other non-Trump candidates as their second and third choices.”

Scott Tranter, who serves as the director of data science at DecisionDeskHQ, argued that consolidation may not be a panacea for taking down Trump. He said that candidates dropping out may help all the remaining candidates, not just Trump’s challengers.

“Consolidation…at least the data that I’ve seen, is not going to disproportionately help or hurt a specific candidate. I think everyone benefits, and that includes Trump,” he said.

But Saul Anusiz, who previously served as head of the Michigan Republican Party and today works as a consultant for conservative causes, argued that consolidation might not be the only way for one of Trump’s opponents to score a victory.

He argued that Republican delegates could be free to choose a different candidate than Trump at the convention if legal or health troubles make it clear that Trump wouldn’t be the best candidate for the party.

“It’s traditionally been kind of an unbound convention where people may (be) committed to a delegate, but they’re not bound legally to cast that ballot,” he said.