Poll: Sanders Opens A Small National Lead As Democratic Divisions Harden

Democratic presidential candidate, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt, and his wave Jane acknowledge the crowd as he arrives for his caucus night rally in Des Moines, Iowa, Monday, Feb. 2, 2016. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)
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Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) has a lead of two percentage points over former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton among Democrats nationwide, while one in four of his supporters do not plan on supporting Clinton if she wins the nomination, according to a McClatchy-Marist poll released Wednesday.

The poll showed support for Sanders at 49 percent while Clinton stood at 47 percent. Furthermore, 25 percent of Sanders supporters said they would not support Clinton as the Democratic nominee in the general election, while only 14 percent of Clinton supporters said the same of Sanders.

This is the first McClatchy-Marist poll of Democrats nationwide, and it contrasts sharply with recent polling, nearly all of which shows Clinton enjoying a comfortable lead. TPM’s PollTracker Average shows Clinton at 47.4 percent, and Sanders at 42.5 percent.

The McClatchy-Marist poll was carried out from March 29-31 using live phone interviews. Pollsters surveyed 444 people likely to vote in the Democratic primary, with a margin of error of 4.7 percentage points.

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Notable Replies

  1. Won’t matter. Delegate count is now: 1748 for Clinton, 1058 for Sanders. 2383 needed for the nomination. Sanders would need to gain delegates at a 2-1 margin from here on out.

  2. The polling data from Wisconsin was way off and outside of the margin of error (Bernie won by a much larger margin than polling data suggested)…so maybe this lead is also larger. Just saying…

    Go ahead and lay it on me HRC supporters. I wore my thick skin today. :smile:

  3. Sanders would have needed to win Wisconsin be a large enough margin to gain 57 delegates to Clinton’s 26. He didn’t. He gathered 47 to her 36. It was a respectable victory, but even if he wins all the rest of the States by the margin he won Wisconsin, he’ll still fall short in the end. If the primary season was just starting, he’d have a solid shot, but we’re well into it though, so it’s not realistic to imagine a Sanders win at this point.

  4. Delegates are divided proportionately in Dem primaries so unless Bernie can really trounce her in just about every primary between now and the convention there’s no way he can catch up. This includes super delegates who are likely to support the party, so unless Bernie starts showing some support for the party itself, he’s unlikely to sway any of them outside of a few.

  5. Notice how Bernie voters wont support Clinton in far greater numbers than Clinton voters who wont support Sanders. And we can thank Sanders voters in Wisconsin for voting for that right wing crank to the Wis. Supreme Court…thank you Sanders voters for being so uninformed.

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