Biden leads Trump by 15 points in latest Quinnipiac poll

Former Vice President Joe Biden has widened his lead over President Trump to 15 points in a new national Quinnipiac University poll.

The poll released Wednesday shows Biden with 52 percent of the vote to Trump’s 37 percent, the widest lead for the presumptive Democratic nominee recorded by a Quinnipiac survey to date.

A similar poll from last month found Biden leading Trump by 8 points. The last time Biden had a double-digit lead in the survey was in May, when he led by 11 points.

The latest poll brings particularly grim news for Trump. His overall job approval rating dropped to 36 percent, its lowest point in more than two years, while the number of respondents who disapprove of his performance climbed to 60 percent, a 5-point increase since June.

In a switch from last month, respondents now said that Biden would do a better job handling the U.S. economy, with 50 percent backing him on the issue and 45 percent choosing Trump, who has staked much of his reelection bid on the argument that he is better equipped to steer the economy.

At the same time, voter approval of Trump’s job on the economy is underwater: 44 percent approve while 53 percent disapprove. That marks his worst net approval on the economy since August 2017, according to Quinnipiac polling data.

“Yes, there’s still 16 weeks until Election Day, but this is a very unpleasant real time look at what the future could be for President Trump,” said Tim Malley, a Quinnipiac University polling analyst. “There is no upside, no silver lining, no encouraging trend hidden somewhere in this survey for the president.”

Biden’s recent surge in the race against Trump owes in large part to independent voters, according to Quinnipiac, with Biden leading among the group 51 percent to 34 percent. In June, the poll found independents split between the two candidates, with 43 percent backing Biden and 40 percent backing Trump.

The Quinnipiac poll is only the latest to find support for Trump dwindling. Surveys conducted both nationally and in key battleground states in recent months show Biden pulling ahead in the presidential race as Trump struggles to contain multiple national crises, including the coronavirus pandemic, a turbulent economic outlook and civil unrest over racial injustice.

The poll surveyed 1,273 registered voters from July 9-13. It has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 2.8 percentage points.