GOP Primary Voters Actually Don't Really Care If Candidates Support The Nominee

For nine months, much has been made of the August 2015 pledge each GOP presidential candidate signed promising to support the eventual nominee of the party. Last night during a town hall forum hosted by CNN, that pledge fell apart as Donald Trump, Senator Ted Cruz and Governor John Kasich all either refused to support the eventual nominee or strongly distanced themselves from doing so. 

But according to a new Rasmussen Report, the vast majority of GOP primary voters don't really care about the pledge or about the eventual nominee being supported by former rivals.

Rasmussen Reports polling finds that only 31% of Republican voters believe candidates who don’t win the party’s presidential nomination should be required to publicly support the person who is nominated.

Still, 60% of Republicans say it is at least somewhat important to their vote that candidates who don’t win their party’s presidential nomination publicly support the person who is, although just 33% say it is Very Important to their vote. Among unaffiliated voters who are very likely to determine the outcome of this year’s presidential contest, only 14% consider party unity a Very Important issue.