More Grim Polling For Biden As He Seeks To Salvage Campaign

Post-debate polls are looking grim for Biden. A much-anticipated NYT/Siena College poll, released yesterday, showed that Trump now leads Biden 49 percent to 43 percent among likely voters nationally, a three-point swing since the debate.

• Similarly, a WSJpoll found that, "Donald Trump has opened a 6-point lead over President Biden (up from 2% in February) among voters nationally, with 80% saying that the president is too old to run for a second term."
• The NYT poll found: "A majority of every demographic, geographic and ideological group in the poll... believe Mr. Biden, 81, is too old to be effective.”
• Perhaps most damning for Biden, the poll also revealed further concerns about Biden’s underperformance in swing states compared to Democrat Senate candidates.
• Elections analyst Nate Silver noted this week: “…voters are making a crystal-clear distinction between Biden and other Democrats. In polls of states that are highly competitive in both the presidential race and the Senate, there literally hasn’t been a single poll showing the Democratic Senate candidate losing since March — whereas almost none of the exact same polls show Biden winning.”
• The polling hints at two reasons why pivoting to a new nominee could be strategically logical for Democrats. Firstly, the Democrat agenda appears to be broadly popular, as evidenced by Democrat candidates performing well in competitive races. Secondly, as voter concerns are focused on Biden, a new nominee would likely have a higher floor when campaigning provides broader name recognition.