Two polls released a day after Joe Biden held his first campaign rally in Pittsburgh show the former US vice-president ahead of his rivals for the Democratic presidential nomination, improving his numbers by six to 11 points.
The Morning Consult poll conducted between April 22-28 showed Biden was the first choice for 36 percent of Democratic voters planning to take part in their state’s primary, a six-point increase from last week.
Biden announced his official bid for the Democratic nomination last Thursday. A second poll, by SSRS for CNN, has given Biden a 24-point lead on Senator Bernie Sanders as the top choice for 39 percent of Democrats. That figure was 28 percent in March.
New 2020 @CNN poll just out:
Biden 39%
Sanders 15%
Warren 8%
Buttigieg 7%
O’Rourke 6%
Harris 5%
Booker 2%
Gabbard 2%
Klobuchar 2%
Castro 1%
Gillibrand 1%
Inslee 1%
Swalwell 1%
Williamson 1%
Yang 1%
de Blasio <1%
Ryan <1%
Bennet 0%
Delaney 0%
Hickenlooper 0%
Messam 0%
Moulton 0%— Ryan Struyk (@ryanstruyk) April 30, 2019
The two men are the only candidates in the race with double-digit support, though Sanders fell by two points in the Morning Consult poll.
The news came after a poll of voters in the historically red state of Texas revealed on Monday that President Donald Trump (49 percent) and Barack Obama’s former second-in-command are almost equal in a hypothetical match-up, with Biden just ahead on 50 percent.
The Emerson College poll of 799 voters showed similar results in a match-up between Trump and Beto O’Rourke or Sanders (50:50 percent; 51:49 percent respectively). Texas hasn’t elected a Democrat president since Jimmy Carter in 1976.’
Read more: Polls show Biden leads race for Democratic presidential nominee
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