538: Warren's Rise Hasn't Come At Biden's Expense

[crazytown]

Last edited Mon Oct 14, 2019, 07:19 AM - Edit history (1)

538, October 14, 2019
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/elizabeth-warren-rise-hasnt-come-at-joe-biden-expense/

Warren’s Rise Hasn’t Come At Biden’s Expense
Biden’s numbers are steady in post-Ukraine polls

(snip) Joe Biden is still doing reasonably well in the polls.

Elizabeth Warren’s doing well, too! She probably hasn’t overtaken Biden in national polls, yet, but it’s pretty darn close — close enough that she was momentarily ahead in one national polling average (from RealClearPolitics) last week. You’d certainly rather be in Warren’s shoes than Biden’s in Iowa and New Hampshire. (Although not in South Carolina, and the Super Tuesday states aren’t so clear.) In fact, if you want to argue that she’s the most likely nominee, I don’t have any real problem with that. I also don’t have any real problem if you think it’s Biden, or that it’s too close to call.

But Warren’s gains have come mostly at the expense of the rest of the field — from Kamala Harris and Bernie Sanders, in particular — and from other candidates, such as Cory Booker, whose campaigns never really took off in the first place. Relatively little of Warren’s increased support has come from Biden, whose topline numbers have mostly been steady.

In fact, Biden’s numbers haven’t declined at all since President Trump’s phone call with Ukraine became the dominant political story. We can see this by taking a before and after comparison of polls that have come out in the past couple of weeks.

[UncleNoel]

1. Oops! Didn't see your post. You beat me to it. Sorry.

You edited it better than I did. Looks like we were working on it at the same time.

I did, however, post the polls.

[crazytown]

2. Hey. It is important. No problem.

[BlueMTexpat]

3. Hi! Thanks for

posting!

But I saw UncleNoel's first and responded there.

It's a good article, IMO.

[DrFunkenstein]

4. 70% of Voters Haven't Picked Biden Yet

For someone so well known, that is worrisome. If he was running a stellar campaign, you could see where he might be able to close the deal.

Biden won 0% of the vote in his first Presidential campaign, and less than 1% in his second.

The big difference now is that he added "Obama's wingman" to his resume. But for 70% that has clinched the deal, so you wonder what he has to do to change that.

Warren, on the other hand, it still a relatively unfamiliar candidate. Most people got their first glimpse of her during the "Pocahontas" scandal. She has survived and thrived since then, and people taking a second look are much more likely to see her as a viable contender running a disciplined, well-organized campaign full of big ideas and free of careless gaffes.

As Nate Silver says, "Warren has surpassed him on measures of enthusiasm, she tends to have better favorability ratings than he does, and, obviously, Iowa and New Hampshire are huge potential liabilities for Biden if he loses them."

[highplainsdem]

5. K&R!