New Poll Shows Biden Campaign Is Losing Momentum
A new poll shows that although former Vice President Joe Biden remains ahead of the rest of the pack of Democratic presidential hopefuls, his support has slipped in recent weeks.
The poll conducted by SSRS for CNN found that 32 percent of respondents support Biden. An April survey showed that Biden had the support of 39 percent of those polled, CNN reported.
Despite Biden’s softening in the poll, he is still well ahead of Sen. Bernie Sanders; the Vermont independent received 18 percent support.
Sanders and Biden remain the only two candidates to poll in double digits.
Sens. Kamala Harris of California and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts finished third and fourth respectively. Harris polled 8 percent support while Warren was at 7 percent. South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg and former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke each were at 5 percent support.
Sen. Cory Booker received 3 percent support; former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Julián Castro and Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota each polled at 2 percent support. Fourteen other candidates were included in the poll, but all were at 1 percent support or below.
The new poll approximates the broad trend of most polls, most of which show Biden at the top followed by Sanders with a knot of hopefuls in the mid-to-high single digits and a large cluster of candidates below 5 percent in the polls.
The Real Clear Politics average of polls shows Biden at 34.9 percent and Sanders at 16.9 percent.
The new poll showed that 44 percent of respondents have made up their minds already, even though the first debate is not until later this month, and the first balloting is not until next February. Among voters who have their minds firmly made up, Biden is the choice of 43 percent while Sanders has the support of 29 percent of those voters.
The poll suggested that identity remains a major factor in poll standing noting that 59 percent of respondents had never heard of Buttigieg.
The first Democratic debates, scheduled for June 26 and June 27, could change that. One GOP strategist said candidates are focusing on those opportunities to make their case to the voters.
“Maybe you have three minutes in a debate, four minutes; what are you going to do? Are you going to try to swing for the fences, the way [Marco] Rubio did going after Trump? Or are you going to attack somebody else?” Stuart Stevens, chief strategist for Republican Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign, told Politico.
“It’s just an impossible situation. … The Lincoln-Douglas debates, it wasn’t Lincoln, Douglas, Johnson, Smith, Harris, Fitzgerald, O’Reilly. It was Lincoln-Douglas.”
Candidates admit there is an element of chance in the Miami debate lineup. Those candidates who qualify will find out which night they debate and who they debate with after a random drawing.
“It’s going to be really interesting because you’re going to have so many people, and it’s luck of the draw which night you’re going to be, who you’re going to be standing next to — maybe going to be really tall, don’t know,” Klobuchar said.
The CNN poll was conducted May 28 through 31. Results among 412 Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents who are registered to vote have a 6 point margin of error. The poll’s overall results had a 3.8 point margin of error.
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