Scrapped Iowa Poll Reportedly Showed Biden Cratering to Fourth Place

The last Iowa poll before the caucuses, which was not publicly released after its results were “compromised,” found that Bernie Sanders was holding steady in the lead and that Joe Biden had fallen to a distant fourth place.

According to confirmation by FiveThirtyEight, the poll was going to report Sanders with 22% support in Iowa, Elizabeth Warren in second with 18%, Pete Buttigieg with 16%, and Biden trailing behind at 13%. That result would’ve pegged Biden’s support at more than six percentage points below his current level in the RealClearPolitics polling average.

However, the gold-standard Selzer & Co. Iowa poll was abruptly scrapped on Sunday night after one surveyor reportedly changed the font on their screen and inadvertently left off Pete Buttigieg’s name from the list of candidate choices. Since the pollster was unable to assess the impact of Buttigieg’s partial omission, the poll was considered statistically unreliable.

“Imagine the news cycle that would have been, with national front-runner Biden making such a poor showing in the last, highest-profile poll before the caucuses,” FiveThirtyEight’s Clare Malone noted of how that poll, if viable, could’ve shaped the final news narrative heading into the vote.