Poll: Rubio holds 33-point lead over GOP primary challenger

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) overwhelmingly leads his GOP primary challenger with less than a month until votes are cast, a new poll finds.

{mosads}A new St. Pete Polls survey found that Rubio leads wealthy businessman Carlos Beruff by 33 points, 55 to 22 percent. About 5 percent are undecided, and 19 percent would vote for someone else in the GOP primary.

The Florida senator comfortably leads Beruff in all race, gender and age breakdowns.

Beruff has been self-funding his campaign and has already injected $4 million of his own money into the race. In June, he said he’s planning to contribute up to $15 million more, according to the Miami Herald. But he’s already spent most of that money, and Rubio has a significant cash advantage.

The GOP senator is favored to win the Aug. 30 primary and advance to the general election in an effort to hold onto his toss-up seat that could be pivotal in which party gains control of the Senate majority next year.

He’ll likely square off against Rep. Patrick Murphy (D-Fla.), who faces his own primary challenge against Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.). But multiple Democrats have called on Grayson to drop out of the race following allegations of domestic violence from his ex-wife.

The poll was conducted on Tuesday and surveyed 1,835 likely GOP primary voters via an automated phone calling system. The margin of error was 2.3 percentage points.