Poll: Majority of Republicans support Trump's Muslim ban

Nearly two-thirds of likely GOP primary voters support Republican presidential front-runner Donald TrumpDonald TrumpHobby Lobby founder endorses Rubio Trump disavows David Duke endorsement Rubio earns rare primary endorsement from key Va. newspaper MORE’s proposal to ban Muslims from coming into the country, a new poll found.

A Bloomberg Politics/Purple Strategies PulsePoll released Wednesday found that the real estate mogul’s latest remarks are backed by 65 percent of likely GOP voters. When told both sides of the argument, support for Trump’s proposal remained relatively unchanged at 64 percent.

The online poll conducted Wednesday also found that about 37 percent of those surveyed would be more likely to vote for the businessman after his call to temporarily halt Muslims from entering the United States until elected leaders can “figure out what’s going on.”

“We believe these numbers are made up of some people who are truly expressing religious bigotry and others who are fearful about terrorism and are willing to do anything they think might make us safer,” Doug Usher of Purple Strategies, said. "This indicates that, despite some conventional wisdom expressed in the last 48 hours, this is unlikely to hurt Trump at least in the primary campaign."

Among likely Republican primary voters, Trump has a favorability rating a of 65 percent — 1 percentage point higher than rival Sen. Marco RubioMarco RubioRubio crowd gets pushy with protestor Hobby Lobby founder endorses Rubio Rubio earns rare primary endorsement from key Va. newspaper MORE (Fla.), and 4 percentage points higher than Sen. Ted CruzTed CruzRubio crowd gets pushy with protestor Hobby Lobby founder endorses Rubio Rubio earns rare primary endorsement from key Va. newspaper MORE (Texas). However, of the three GOP candidates whose favorability was measured in the poll, Trump has the highest unfavorable ratings, 33 percent compared to Rubio's 22 percent and Cruz's 26 percent.

Despite high support among Republicans for Trump's proposal, only 18 percent of Democrats support his idea; overall, the poll found that only 37 percent support Trump’s ban while 50 percent oppose it. He also has a negative favorability of 64 percent.

The online poll surveyed 605 likely 2016 general election voters. The overall margin of error is 4 percentage points and the margin of error of likely GOP primary voters is 7 percentage points.