Nearly a quarter of Marco Rubio's supporters don't know what he looks like

While Marco Rubio has been the Republican establishment's favorite presidential candidate for a while now, he's struggled to take off in either Iowa or New Hampshire. Nationwide, he's a distant third with 11 percent — more than 25 points behind Donald Trump.

Vox and Morning Consult's facial recognition poll might help explain why: Only 54 percent of American voters overall, and only 62 percent of Republican voters, could correctly identify a photo of Rubio in an online survey:

Vox/Morning Consult, Vox/Javier Zarracina

Digging into the poll internals, Morning Consult's data team found something even more surprising: Only 76 percent of Rubio's supporters can recognize a picture of the candidate, implying that 24 percent of his fans saw a photo of him and either misidentified it as another candidate or didn't know who it was.

Maybe this doesn't matter; you don't need to know what candidates look like to vote for them, of course. But Rubio's relative obscurity among his own fans is still striking — especially compared with a candidate like Trump, who had no supporters misidentify him.

We have a request

Vox's journalism is free because we believe that everyone deserves to understand the world that they live in. That kind of knowledge helps create better citizens, neighbors, friends, parents, consumers and stewards of this planet. In short, understanding benefits everyone. You can join in on this mission by making a financial gift to Vox today. Reader support helps keep our work free, for everyone. Will you join us?

One-Time Monthly Annual

$95/year

$120/year

$250/year

$350/year

Other

$

Yes, I'll give $120/year

Yes, I'll give $120/year

We accept credit card, Apple Pay, and Google Pay. You can also contribute via