Bernie, Biden Beat Trump in Hypothetical Race
President Donald Trump loses in the a presidential race to Independent Vermont Senator and former presidential candidate Bernie Sanders and former Democratic VP Joe Biden by double digits, according to a new Morning Consult/Politico poll.
He also loses to Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts. But in each, the "don't know" category of undecideds is large enough to be the determining factor, so long as they wind up voting.
Those results are also if the hypothetical race were run today.
But what might be as significant are how many people said they don't know which way they would vote.
Sanders gets 44% to Trump's 32%, but 24% said they didn't know. Biden gets 43% to Trump's 31%, but 26% said they don't know. Warren edges him out 34% to 30%, but 36% don't know.
The poll was taken Aug.16-18, before the bombshell events of Tuesday (Aug. 21), when former Trump campaign manager Paul Manaforte was convicted on eight counts and former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen plead guilt to eight counts of federal crimes, the latter including campaign finance violations in which he implicated the President--payoffs to women claiming affairs with Trump before he was President.
Other poll results included that a plurality (39%) said revelations in Omarosa's book--including that the President used the N-word--were not credible vs. 74% said the President tweeted too much, though 29% said not enough; and 64% said his use of Twitter was a bad thing.
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The weighted online poll was conducted Aug. 16-18 among a national sample of 1,974 registered voters. It has a margin of error of plus or minus two percentage points.
Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.