Mitch Perry
Hillary Clinton may be struggling against Vermont independent U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders in the early voting states of Iowa and New Hampshire, but Berniemania hasn’t come to the Sunshine State, according to a Public Policy Polling survey released Tuesday.
The former secretary of state and New York U.S. senator dominates the Democratic primary race with 55 percent of the vote. Sanders is a distant second with 18 percent, followed closely by Vice President Joe Biden at 17 percent despite him not running yet.
Despite Sanders’ relatively modest showing against Clinton, it’s actually an increase in 15 percentage points for him since March, PPP’s most recent Democratic presidential survey. Clinton is down 3 points from that poll, with Biden up by 3 points.
PPP reports that the numbers continue to indicate that if Biden enters the race it will hurt Clinton a lot more than it does Sanders. Fifty-four percent of Biden voters say Clinton is their second choice, to 14 percent who say Sanders is. If you reallocate Biden’s voters to their second choice, Clinton’s lead over Sanders in the state goes up to 64/21.
Clinton’s hold on the Democratic electorate in Florida is pretty consistent across demographic lines. She’s at 75 percent with Hispanics, 64 percent with “somewhat liberal” voters, 58 percent with women, 57 percent with younger voters, 56 percent with “very liberal” voters, 54 percent with seniors, 52 percent with whites, 52 percent with men, and 50 percent with moderates. The one group she’s below 50 percent with has been one of her strongest in most states: African-Americans with whom she gets just 48 percent, because of a 34 percent showing for Biden.
Public Policy Polling surveyed 814 voters Sept. 11 to 13, including 377 Republican primary voters and 368 Democratic primary voters. The margin of error for the overall survey is +/-3.4 percent, for the Republican primary voters it’s +/-5.1 percent, and for the Democratic primary voters it’s +/-5.1 percent.
