At Hot Air, Allahpundit calls attention to a poll of likely Democratic voters in New Hampshire taken by the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Joe Biden comes in first with 28 percent support. Bernie Sanders follows Biden with 20 percent. After that, it’s Kamala Harris (14 percent) and Elizabeth Warren (9 percent).
What do Biden and Sanders have in common? Not ideology. They are on opposite ends of the Democrats’ ideological spectrum, though it remains to be seen how far apart they will position themselves (assuming Biden runs).
The commonalities are (1) both have strong name recognition, having run national campaigns and (2) both are white and male.
New Hampshire Democrats are overwhelmingly white and, with the exception of 2016, prone to favoring high-profile, “mainstream” candidates (e.g., Al Gore, John Kerry, and Hillary Clinton in 2008). Thus, it’s not surprising that Sen. Harris, who only recently burst onto the scene, runs behind Biden and Sanders. 14 percent isn’t a bad showing for her.
But what about Sen. Warren? Okay, she hasn’t run for national office before. But she’s been a fixture on the national political landscape for years and, as Allahpundit notes, hails from Massachusetts, just across the border from New Hampshire.
Thus, she should be polling in New Hampshire — better, at least, than Harris.
Warren did come in first in one category tested by the UMass pollsters, though. 26 percent of likely Democratic voters named her as the one candidate they definitely won’t support.
Sen. Warren isn’t likely to find better footing in states with more racially and ethically diverse populations than New Hampshire. Indeed, her false claim of being an Indian could hurt her in such states.
Allahpundit concludes:
As things now stand, she has no “lane” in the primary: She’s not the leading class warrior, she’s not an identity-politics candidate, she’s certainly not a centrist, she’s only one of several women running. There’s no good case for her except, I guess, among that segment of Berniebros who’ve reluctantly concluded that Sanders is too old to get elected at this point.
It’s very early days, but this seems like sound analysis.
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