How is Joe Biden doing in a trial heat against Donald Trump? In particular, how is he doing with young voters and Black voters? Take your pick:
Both polls were in the field at nearly the same time. But the Suffolk poll says Biden is behind with young voters 33%-37% while the YouGov poll says he's ahead 51%-33%. That's a net swing of 22 points.
The big difference is that in the Suffolk poll 30% of young voters say they're undecided or would vote for a third party. In the YouGov poll only 12% say that. This is a difference of 18 points, and accounts for most of the disparity between the two polls.
Among Black voters, the two polls largely agree. Suffolk says Biden has a +51% lead while YouGov says he has a +52% lead.
In the end, I doubt these two polls really disagree that much. For some reason, the Suffolk poll picked up a much larger protest vote among young people, but that's not likely to stand the test of time.
Black unemployment - Trump - Jan-2021:
9.9%
Black unemployment - Biden - Nov-2023:
5.8%
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS14000006
There's currently a lot of bad feeling against Biden in this household because of his uncritical, unyielding support and enablement of Israel's genocide of Palestinians in both Gaza and the West Bank.
However, he's definitely got our votes. Because there are other important issues.
And of those issues that young voters care most about, Republicans are on the wrong side:
https://circle.tufts.edu/latest-research/youth-2022-concerned-about-issues-neglected-campaigns
Biden's been critical of Israel.
Why lie about it?
Good to hear. I get the sense, @Salamander, that you are a strongly Progressive Dem (I am a Normie Liberal) but we are going to need everyone on the left side of the line here to hold back small hands.
I like to think and there is evidence that as things get closer to the wire, various folks with various grievances, especially from the more Progressive end, will come home.
I think loads of young people just won't vote because Biden didn't bribe them directly (student loan forgiveness, more "stimulus" or housing vouchers, etc.). As Salamander says, there are a lot of issues at stake, but I hear so many young people (our kid is in their 20s) basically saying "Biden hasn't done anything for me; I'll never own a house; we're all gonna die from climate change."
Biden did do Student loan forgiveness but it was the SC that blocked him. Voters may not care but at least be honest about what happened
The election is still 11 months away and I'm not very concerned at this point. If he's still behind by a few points come Labor Day then it's time to panic
Bingo. At this stage of the game, polls are only useful in noting which voters are not on board, which issues they want to be reassured about. This is something the "horserace coverage" of the MSM never seems to grasp ... or at least, to discuss and analyze. It's always merely Trump is in the lead with Old Joe two lengths behind; Desantis is fading fast as Haley moves ahead by a nose as they round the first curve!!
"At this stage of the game, polls are only useful in noting which voters are not on board, .."
Because the low response rates, it is not obvious that they give you even that. They are telling you about some fraction of the voters, and it is not obvious that this fraction is a good representative of anything.
The younglings need to be reminded of all the wonderful achievements of President Jill Stein and President Ralph Nader. We could have had a 4-5 Supreme Court, instead of our 6-3 nightmare. We wouldn't have had a President working out his daddy issues with a second Gulf War.
But maybe Susan Sarandon is right. Let things get bad enough, the political revolution will come and we will enter hand in hand into the Progressive Promised Land.
It’s not like President Gore would have prioritized action on climate change…/s
I remember back in the day trying to convince one of my coworkers not to vote for Nader. Nader's big line was that there was no difference between Bush and Gore, and both would say anything to get elected. Nader either believed that, in which case he was an idiot, or he was just saying that to get elected... Either way, he didn't deserve anyone's vote.
And to this day, I remain in the "Never Bernie" camp (unless he was the 2020 nominee, in which case it would have been "Go, Bernie, go!"). I do understand the Bernie to Trump voters, since I think those voters never understood the difference between "Obamacare isn't good enough, and we need to replace it with Medicare for all" and the more vacuous "Obamacare is terrible, we have to replace it with something wonderful". Having lived in Canada and had a fine time with their medical system, I've got nothing against government run healthcare. I just have something against running on it only 6 years after the biggest change in US healthcare in my lifetime that was only achieved by some fraction of the democratic Congress sacrificing their careers to get it passed.
(And anyone who didn't see the Wikileaks coming, timed to the Bernie/Hillary `reconcilliation' during the convention, because he wasn't going to drop out before that, wasn't really paying attention.)
I've grown tired of attempts at N-dimensional chess, trying to game out worse short term decisions for hoped for long term gains. I'd rather a Nikki Haley Republican nomination now, even though I think she'd likely win over Biden in a romp, to avoid a possible Trump win later. I know that Haley situation ain't gonna happen. But it's more likely than the "political revolution".
She has said that she'll pardon him, and that should tell you how much she cares about actually renovating the Greedy Old Party. I expect that sort of toadyism from Ronito DeSantolini, but not her.
"She has said that she'll pardon him,.."
But she is not going to abolish democracy, which is the main problem with Trump presidency. So she will be an awful president, but there will be elections in 2026 and 2028.
DeSantis probably that same, but I would be less confident with him.
Exactly. At this point I'd take worst case scenario of "awful president" over "end of the Republic".
I'm voting for Biden (or whoever is the D nominee) so long as I'm still alive next November. But I'd take Christie > Haley > DeSantis > Trump nomination now, or the 14th Amendment routes out now, over rolling the dice that we don't elect Trump come the election. Sort out the consequences later.
As I said above, Republicans are on the wrong side of every issue of concern to young voters, and most* that older voters care about, too. Haley has tap-danced around reproductive rights, racial and gender justice and more — how long can she avoid taking a position on those? Once she does, she will lose support from one side or the other. She has a position on the Paris Accord: she would withdraw. Not going to attract young voters, or any concerned about climate change, with that.
*Against evidence, voters think that the GOP is better on the economy and crime — both of which have steadily improved this year, on Biden’s watch.
She is right, in a way: You'll notice that when things got bad enough back in 2008 for Replicans they were willing to vote for a black man. Afterwards? Cue Blazing Saddles.
South seems over represented in the USA Today poll.
Are these (or any) political polls these days worth caring about?
I thought it was well established that, since the 20teens political polls were basically useless (self-selection and people refusing to respond), as evidenced, not least, in the Brexit and Trump 2016 polling.
In other words, regardless of whether you like or dislike what these polls claim, the very first question is: should you even CARE?
I don’t. Response rates well down in single digits. How do you adjust for that?