New poll shows Bernie Sanders leading Hillary Clinton by record margins in New Hampshire and Iowa
Tami Chappell / REUTERS
It might be time for Hillary Clinton’s campaign to panic.
According to a YouGov/CBS News poll released Sunday Bernie Sanders is leading the former secretary of state and once-presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, by wide margins in both Iowa and New Hampshire.
In New Hampshire, the Vermont senator leads Clinton 52 percent to 30 percent, with Vice President Joe Biden—who has still not decided whether to officially run—garnering 9 percent among likely Democratic primary voters. It’s the fourth straight poll show Sanders up in the Granite State, but the first to show a double-digit lead.
Sanders celebrated the results on Twitter:
He also received support from 70 percent of New Hampshire independents who say they’ll vote in the Democratic primary.
In Iowa, Sanders leads Clinton 43 percent to 33 percent, with Biden nabbing 10 percent of those surveyed. Clinton had consistently ledSanders in Iowa, until a Quinnipiac poll Thursday showed the two to be even.
Clinton maintains her strong lead in South Carolina, according to Sunday’s poll, with 46 percent saying she was their first choice, compared to Sanders at 23 percent and Biden at 22 percent. It is the closest margin polled among the 2016 Democratic candidates to date in the Palmetto State.
Sanders supporters are significantly more enthusiastic than Clinton supporters, the poll said:
Seventy-eight percent of Sanders voters in New Hampshire, and 63 percent of his voters in Iowa, say they enthusiastically support him, while just 39 percent of Clinton’s backers in New Hampshire and 49 percent in Iowa say they enthusiastically support her.
Another takeaway is that Democrats don’t care about Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email address while at the State Department. Last Tuesday, Clinton apologized for the “mistake” in a interview with ABC News.
But across the board in New Hampshire, Iowa, and South Carolina, about three-quarters of primary voters say that issue “doesn’t matter.”
So what is powering the Sanders surge?
According to the poll, while those surveyed thought both Clinton and Sanders would enact policies benefitting the middle class, “voters in New Hampshire and Iowa are relatively more likely to believe Clinton will enact policies favoring the wealthy.”
Sanders supporters were particularly skeptical. “Almost half” of Sanders supporters in New Hampshire and 37 percent in Iowa thought Clinton’s policies favored the rich.
The relative skepticism comes despite the Clinton campaign’s strategy to cast her as a populist. Clinton has even backed progressive financial regulation, railed against a “political system hijacked by billionaires,” and proposed increasing the capital gains tax.
For some, however, that apparently is not enough.
Much as been made about when or if the Clinton campaign should panic. Now could be that time.
2016 presidential candidates
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