Most Conservative members prefer Badenoch to Tugendhat/Stride is entirely obvious. (Rightwing politics esp anti-woke stridency is obvs more important than the skin colour of a copartisan) They are just saying that in a survey to not look prejudiced is literally a crackerjack view. Why would they?

Whether might be a conscious/subconscious bias towards Asian/black strident anti-woke and anti-left voices (ie Badenoch/Braverman > Jenrick) is hard to disentangle. It seems possible this own the left motive at the margin for copartisans may neutralise ethnonationalist rejection at the 1-3% level

'Why would they?' Because noone who is racist wants to admit they are racist to a pollster.