New Poll: About 8 in 10 Democrats Satisfied With Harris as Nominee — Fewer Than 4 in 10 Were Satisfied With Biden
AP Photo/John Raoux, File
A new poll shows a high level of Democratic unity supporting Vice President Kamala Harris as the party’s presumptive nominee.
As calls grew for President Joe Biden to drop out of the presidential race, some Democrats voiced concerns about whether that would lead to a rushed and divisive primary and if the party would be able to quickly coalesce behind a candidate in time to effectively take on former President Donald Trump.
The Harris campaign has seen a massive spike in fundraising and the DNC delegates have lined up behind her, with the vice president being the only candidate to qualify for the virtual roll call vote that will begin Thursday, all but guaranteeing she will soon be the official Democratic nominee.
The poll by the Associated Press/NORC Center for Public Affairs Research quantifies how high that party unity for Harris is.
Conducted July 25-29, 2024 after Biden stepped aside, the poll questioned 1,141 adults online and via telephone using both landlines and cell phones. The margin of error was +/- 4.1 percent.
When asked “How satisfied would you be if Kamala Harris became the Democratic nominee for president?” 79 percent of Democrats answered “very satisfied” or “somewhat satisfied.”
This is a significant improvement over Biden’s numbers from earlier this month. In a poll taken July 11-15, only 37% of Democrats said they were “very satisfied” or “somewhat satisfied” with Biden as the party’s “likely nominee for president,” with a margin of error of +/- 3.8 percent.
Screenshot via AP.
Unsurprisingly, Harris polls poorly with Republicans — as Trump does with Democrats — but she is noticeably stronger than Biden in terms of favorability across the board. Eighty percent of Democrats have a favorable opinion of Harris compared to 75 percent for Biden, and 36 percent of independents had a favorable view of Harris compared to 27 percent for Biden. The vice president also slightly improved Biden’s numbers with Republicans, with 12 percent viewing her favorably and 10 percent viewing Biden favorably.
Perhaps most importantly as the Harris campaign seeks to define her in the ninety or so days remaining until Election Day, Harris also has a higher number of voters of all partisan persuasions responding that they don’t know enough yet about her.
Screenshot via AP.
Read more about the poll at the AP or the polling memo here.
