A Public Coverage Institute of California survey on Tuesday confirmed Mr. Sanders with a lead of 32 p.c to 14 p.c in opposition to Mr. Biden, placi
A Public Coverage Institute of California survey on Tuesday confirmed Mr. Sanders with a lead of 32 p.c to 14 p.c in opposition to Mr. Biden, placing him in place to assert a transparent majority of delegates from the nation’s largest delegate prize.
Mr. Bloomberg has proven extra energy in latest state polls within the South, the place he has been tied or forward in latest polls of North Carolina, Virginia, Oklahoma and Arkansas. However Mr. Sanders has been extremely aggressive in these states and would nonetheless amass a significant variety of delegates there.
The latest polls outcomes additionally undermine the argument that Mr. Sanders has a tough ceiling on his help. He claimed a lead over Mr. Bloomberg, 57 p.c to 37 p.c, in a hypothetical one-on-one race within the NBC/WSJ ballot, suggesting that his opposition may not inevitably coalesce round a single candidate, if one ever emerged.
As an alternative, the expansion in Mr. Sanders’s help makes it simple to think about how he may run away with the nomination over a divided discipline. A lot of his opponents have an incentive to assault each other, relatively than Mr. Sanders. And Mr. Bloomberg has been a focus of assault this week, leaving Mr. Sanders comparatively unscathed. Mr. Bloomberg may also be the focus of the controversy tonight.
The first calendar provides Mr. Sanders’s rivals few pure alternatives to consolidate their help. As an alternative, he’s closely favored in Nevada, a state stuffed with working-class, city and Hispanic voters — the kind who’ve usually most well-liked Mr. Sanders within the early states and nationwide polls. And whereas South Carolina, with a big proportion of African-American voters, is much less favorable to Mr. Sanders, the state may wind up additional fracturing the sector by propping up a faltering Mr. Biden or elevating an extra candidate, Tom Steyer, who held a mere 2 p.c within the latest nationwide polls.
For a lot of candidates, the debates characterize their solely life like alternative to essentially enhance their place. If something, the impact of Mr. Bloomberg’s colossal advert spending — together with the likelihood that it may very well be turned to assault Mr. Sanders — looms as the only likeliest issue to reshape the trajectory of the race within the last two weeks forward of Tremendous Tuesday.
But on the identical time, the polls recommend that the Democratic path to the presidency could also be more durable than ever in opposition to President Trump, whose approval rankings have improved to properly inside placing distance of re-election. They’ve reached 45.eight p.c amongst registered voters in the FiveThirtyEight tracker, whereas his disapproval has fallen to 50.1 p.c.