Since his abysmal Iowa and New Hampshire showings sparked a collapse in his national polling, Joe Biden’s third presidential bid has been on life support. Now a new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll has indicated that Bernie Sanders is rivaling Biden in popularity with black voters.
If true, that’s curtains for Biden. But don’t believe the hype — it’s not all disastrous news for the former vice president.
Bernie Sanders is now in the lead with Black voters nationwide.
He has always been in the lead with young Black voters, but Black voters over 50 are starting to abandon Biden to support Bernie. https://t.co/HBdGkY0hEA
— Shaun King (@shaunking) February 21, 2020
For starters, the poll’s finding that Sanders trails Biden by just two points is perhaps overstated. The black subsample in the poll comprised only 139 respondents, giving that result a margin of error greater than 8%. So theoretically, Biden could still maintain a double-digit lead over Sanders.
But more importantly, South Carolina polls still aren’t signaling disaster for Biden among black voters. Although his commanding lead in the Palmetto State has diminished somewhat, his black support across multiple polls has held at 30% or more. East Carolina University polling found that his lead with black voters had fallen by eight points, one point less than his overall lead shrinkage.
Biden would really prefer to be sitting on a huge lead, but he has maintained enough of a lead with black voters that he still has a fighting chance.
Sanders is the front-runner, but a weak one. Seeing as how the centrist vote remains in a deadlock, Biden’s campaign is still in serious danger. But until black voters finally have a say in South Carolina, Biden has every incentive to stay in the race.
