Poll: Warren overtakes Biden, Sanders in New Hampshire

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) leads the pack of Democratic presidential candidates in New Hampshire, according to a new Monmouth University Poll survey of the state’s voters, overtaking former Vice President Joe Biden and her top progressive rival, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).

The poll shows Warren with 27 percent support among registered New Hampshire Democrats and unaffiliated voters who are likely to vote in the crucial first-in-the-nation primary on Feb. 11, a significant increase from the 8 percent support she received in Monmouth’s last Granite State poll in May.

{mosads}Biden, meanwhile, saw the largest drop in support over the past four months, plummeting from 36 percent to 25 percent in the most recent survey. Sanders, who previously held the second-place spot behind Biden, registered at 12 percent in the most recent poll, down from 18 percent in May. Sanders attracted more than 60 percent of the vote in state during the 2016 Democratic presidential primary, beating former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton by more than 22 points.

Only one other candidate, South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg, notched double-digit support in Monmouth’s latest New Hampshire poll, coming in at 10 percent.

Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), who has seen her polling numbers decline in recent weeks, finished in fifth place in the most recent New Hampshire poll with 3 percent support. That’s down from 6 percent in May.

The survey is the second major poll in recent days to show Warren overtaking Biden in a critical early state. A Des Moines Register-CNN poll released on Saturday found the Massachusetts senator leading Biden in Iowa, which holds the nation’s first caucus, 22 percent to 20 percent.

It also comes as a poll out Tuesday shows Warren moving to within the margin of error on Biden in Nevada.

Patrick Murray, the director of the Monmouth University Polling Institute, said that Warren’s surge in support has come at a cost to Biden and Sanders. 

She has increased her share of support among self-identified moderate and conservatives by 11 points since May, while Biden saw a 15-point drop in support among those voters. At the same time, Warren’s support among self-described liberals has jumped 28 points since May, while Sanders’s backing has fallen 13 points among that group.

“Warren continues to look stronger with every new poll. She seems to be picking up support across the spectrum with gains coming at the expense of both Biden and Sanders,” Murray said.

She has also seen an uptick in her favorability since May, according to the Monmouth poll, rising from 63 percent favorability four months ago to 74 percent in September, the highest of any candidate. Biden and Sanders, on the other hand, saw their personal favorability dip by 14 points and 10 points, respectively. 

Warren’s rise in New Hampshire flies in the face of questions about her electability in a head-to-head match-up against President Trump. The Monmouth poll found that nearly half of all likely voters — 47 percent — say their first choice for the Democratic nomination is the candidate they agree with most and the one most likely to defeat Trump in 2020.

To be sure, the dynamics of the race in New Hampshire are not set in stone, and the figures released by Monmouth on Tuesday represent only one likely voter model. 

Another voter model that gave more weight to less-likely voters showed Biden in the lead with 27 percent support and Warren in second with 25 percent support. Conversely, a separate model that weighted traditional primary voters more heavily showed Warren with 29 percent support and Biden in second with 24 percent.

The latest Monmouth poll showed five other candidates registering at 2 percent in New Hampshire: Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii), Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), billionaire philanthropist Tom Steyer and former tech executive Andrew Yang. No other candidate notched more than 1 percent.

The survey brings particularly good news for Gabbard, giving her the fourth qualifying poll she needed to make the Democratic presidential debate stage in October. She is the twelfth candidate to qualify for that debate. 

The Monmouth University poll surveyed 401 New Hampshire voters who are likely to cast ballots in the state’s Democratic presidential primary from Sept. 17-21. It has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 4.9 percentage points.