MANCHESTER, New Hampshire â Amy Klobuchar has surged past Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Joe Biden just before Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary, according to two polls.
The Minnesota senator, 59, placed third behind Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and Pete Buttigieg, with 14% of the vote, according to the Suffolk University tracking poll released late Sunday.
While Sanders, 78, dominated the 2020 Democratic presidential field with 27% of the vote and Buttigieg, 38, trailed with 19%, Klobuchar’s support represents a 5 percentage point spike compared to the tracking poll published late Saturday.
In Sunday’s poll, the first conducted by Suffolk University after last week’s New Hampshire debate, Biden, 77, and Warren, 70, pulled 12% of the vote apiece.
While polls represent a snapshot in time of what has become a volatile primary, Klobuchar also ranked third in an Emerson College tracking survey unveiled late Sunday.
In that poll, Sanders led the pack with 30% of the vote, Buttigieg attracting 23%, Klobuchar, 14%, Warren, 11%, and Biden, 10%.
The most recent tracking polls suggest Sanders has solidified his home-field advantage as a public official from a neighboring state. He beat Hillary Clinton in New Hampshire during the 2016 cycle by 20 percentage points.
Earlier polls indicated that he and Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, were neck-and-neck ahead of Tuesday’s second contest, echoing the results from Iowa’s Feb. 3 caucuses. In Iowa, Buttigieg squeaked by Sanders with 14 delegates to his 12, increasing the likelihood of a protracted fight for the nomination.
Although Klobuchar welcomed the polls, they bode poorly for Warren, who is facing questions regarding her electability given that her famed ground game failed to turn out caucusgoers in Iowa, and her struggles to appeal to minority Democrats in South Carolina.
The results, however, won’t be surprising to Biden. The former vice president has been publicly setting low expectations ahead of Tuesday night, mirroring efforts his staff started last fall.
Both the Suffolk University and Emerson College polls were fielded between Feb. 8 and Feb. 9.
Suffolk University researchers surveyed 500 likely New Hampshire Democratic primary voters for a margin of error of plus or minus 4.4 percentage points. Emerson College pollsters quizzed 500 likely New Hampshire Democratic primary voters for a margin of error of plus or minus 4.3 percentage points.
