Bush vs. Kerry: Issue Comparisons

September 3, 2004--When it comes to the War on Terror and national defense issues, voter preference for Bush over Kerry moved back in the President's direction this week.

A Rasmussen Reports survey found that 52% of voters trust President Bush more than Senator Kerry on this issue. That's up four from last week's 48%. Before mid-April, preference for the President never fell below 51% on this question. Since then, it has been above that level only twice before this week.

Forty-two percent (42%) of voters prefer Kerry. This marks the second time in three weeks that preference for the Senator has been at 42%.

Selected Demographic Information is available.

Earlier this week, a related survey found that 46% give the President good or excellent marks for his handling of the situation in Iraq. That figure will be updated again on Wednesday.

Voter preference for the candidates is evenly divided when it comes to managing the economy.

The national telephone survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted by Rasmussen Reports over the last two nights. The margin of sampling error for the survey is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence.

Updates Friday at 3:00PM Eastern

Who do you trust more on National Defense?
Date	Bush	Kerry
Sept 3	52	42
Aug 27	48	45
Aug 20	52	42
Aug 13	48	45
Aug 6	50	45
July 30	49	45
July 23	48	45
July 16	51	44
July 9	50	42
July 2	50	42
June 25	49	42
June 18	50	41
June 11	54	38
June 4	50	40
May 28	50	40
May 21	48	40
May 14	51	41
May 7	49	42
Apr 30	50	38
Apr 23	49	40
Apr 16	53	38
Apr 9	51	40
Apr 2	54	36
Mar 26	51	39
Mar 19	54	37
Mar 12	54	37
Mar 5	51	39
Feb 27	51	38
Feb 20	54	37
Feb 13	52	39
Feb 6	52	37
RasmussenReports.com