NEW YORK, New York — NBC News and the Wall Street Journal released a new national poll that has Sen. Bernie Sanders heading into debate night with a double-digit lead. The poll, based on 900 registered voters, shows Sanders in the lead with the support of 27% of Democratic primary voters.
Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who has continued to pour campaign money into advertising and staffing increases across the country, qualified for his first Democratic debate which will take place in Las Vegas on Wednesday night. The new poll confirms the findings of an earlier NPR/PBS/Marist poll that appeared to qualify him for Wednesday’s debate.
NBC News Senior Political Editor Mark Murray breaks down the poll results. Murray said despite Sanders’ unchanged 27% of support from primary voters shown in January’s NBC/WSJ poll, “So much else is different.”
Rosemary Boeglin, the Sanders campaign Northeast Press Secretary, commented on the recent poll, saying, "The strength of our movement comes from our unparalleled grassroots volunteers, who are knocking on Mainer's doors and making phone calls every day ahead of Super Tuesday."
Murray explains the new poll results: “Biden, the former vice president, now gets support from 15 percent of Democratic primary voters, which is down from 26 percent last month. Bloomberg is at 14 percent (up 5 points); Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., also gets 14 percent (down 1 point); and Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Ind., is at 13 percent (up 6 points). Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., gets support from 7 percent of Democratic primary voters, which is up 2 points from last month.”
“There is one clear and inescapable set of results: Bernie Sanders is the definitive [Democratic] frontrunner, and the current numbers do not represent his ceiling, but instead his base with room to grow,” Democratic pollster Peter Hart, who conducted this survey with Republican pollster Bill McInturff of Public Opinion Strategies, told NBC News.
“[Sanders’] downsides are there,” Hart added, “But they’ve yet to be exploited by his opponents.”
The poll shows that Sanders overperforms among liberals and those ages 18-34, while Biden and Bloomberg do best among moderates and conservatives and those 65 and older.
When Sanders is put in head-to-head scenarios, Murray says, the poll shows him ahead, again in double-digits: against Bloomberg, Sanders holds a 20-point national lead 57% percent to 37 percent; against Buttigieg, 54% to 38%.
“In hypothetical general-election matchups, Trump trails five major Democratic candidates, but all of his deficits – except against Biden – are within the poll’s margin of error,” Murray explains. “Biden leads Trump nationally by 8 points, 52% to 44%. Bloomberg is ahead by 7 points, 50% to 43%. Sanders (50% to 46%) and Buttigieg (48% to 44%) hold 4-point advantages over Trump. And Klobuchar leads the president by 3 points, 48% to 45%.”
The Bloomberg campaign Maine Press Secretary Zachary Holman told NEWS CENTER Maine that their one priority is to defeat Trump. "Mike has only been in this race for 90 days -- we're confident that as more people hear our message and bold policies, our support will continue to grow," the campaign said in a statement.
Testing seven different candidate characteristics
The NBC/WSJ poll also asks voters about seven different descriptions for presidential candidates. The most unpopular:
- A combined 67 percent say they have reservations or are “very uncomfortable” with a candidate being a socialist;
- 57 percent have reservations/are very uncomfortable with someone who had a heart attack in the last year;
- 53 percent have reservations/are very uncomfortable with someone who’s older than 75 years of age;
- 41 percent have reservations/are very uncomfortable with someone who self-funds their campaign with hundreds of millions of dollars;
- and a combined 40 percent have reservations/are very uncomfortable with a candidate who is younger than 40 years old.
And finally, the poll shows that a slight majority (51%) backs Trump’s acquittal in the impeachment trial, saying they favor the U.S. Senate’s decision to acquit Trump, compared with 47% who oppose the decision.
The NBC/WSJ poll was conducted Feb. 14-17 of 900 registered voters – more than half of whom were reached by cell phone – and its overall margin of error is plus-minus 3.3 percentage points. The margin for error for the 426 Democratic primary voters the poll measured is plus-minus 4.8 percentage points.
