Back on September 23 when Elizabeth Warren took the lead in Quinnipiac’s Poll of Democrats and Dem-leaners, it was the first time any poll showed her leading the Democratic primary field. It was understandable back then to wonder if the poll was merely an outlier since every other poll seemed to have Joe Biden winning.
Well, Quinnipiac released its latest poll earlier today and Warren continues to lead the poll:
With the next Democratic debate only a week away, Warren and Biden both keep their top of the pack positions in the Democratic primary, with Warren receiving support from 29 percent of Democratic voters and independent voters who lean Democratic and Biden getting 26 percent support. Sanders seems to be the only other candidate left in the mix with the two frontrunners, receiving 16 percent of the vote. No other candidate tops 4 percent.
"Warren maintains her strength in the Democratic primary, which has been consistently growing since the start of her campaign. This poll confirms her status as a co-frontrunner with Biden," added Malloy.
This compares to a September 25 Quinnipiac University poll, in which Warren received 27 percent, Biden got 25 percent, and Sanders had 16 percent.
While Warren has over the past several months increased her support among all grounds, especially notable has been the rise in Warren’s support among Black voters and Biden’s corresponding decline among the same voters.
Back on August 8, Biden was getting 47% of Blacks in the Quinnipiac Poll while Warren was receiving just 8%; now, Biden gets 36% of Blacks while Warren has increased her share to 20%. In just two months, Warren has cut Biden’s advantage among Blacks from 39 points to just 16. Considering the importance of the Black vote within the Democratic Party, this slight, gradual shift to Warren among Black voters is a good sign for her nomination prospects.
Also worth pointing out about the Quinnipiac Poll is that it has been joined in recent weeks by a number of other polls showing Warren topping the Democratic field, indicating clearly that Warren’s surge is real and not merely limited to an outlier poll or two. In fact, this new Quinnipiac poll has pushed Warren into a very slight lead in Real Clear Politics’ overall average of Democratic primary polls:
In other words, we can now state with confidence that Elizabeth Warren is the frontrunner, or at least the co-frontrunner, for the Democratic nomination. Which might explain why supporters of other candidates and now right-wing media have been lobbing silly attacks on her lately, such as this latest nontroversy over whether she really was fired as a public school teacher for being pregnant.
As the frontrunner, Warren can expect more where that came from over the coming days, and she should expect to get piled on in the upcoming debate. Warren’s ability to handle the coming barrage of attacks will truly test whether she has the mettle to be the frontrunner. Judging by her performance so far, I’m confident she will pass that test.
Another item worth mentioning about the Quinnipiac Poll, and really the overall polling and the state of the Democratic race, is how well the less conventional candidates are doing.
Warren and Sanders are running on upending the existing system with radical changes and have refused to do fundraisers with rich donors, and whaddya know they’re running #1 and #3 in the polls, and have raised the most money of all Democratic candidates.
Pete Buttigieg, who has been running a solid fourth, is a gay 37-year old Indiana mayor who also speaks the language of an outsider and disrupter even if his policies are fairly moderate.
Andrew Yang, a Chinese American entrepreneur, started out as a fringe candidate running on Universal Basic Income, yet he has raised a lot of money for a fringe candidate and now is apparently tied with Kamala Harris in the latest Quinnipiac Poll.
It goes to show that these are indeed unconventional times, consistent with what we’ve been seeing with politics all over the country and the globe. And it seems the Democratic Party is not immune to this desire to break from convention.