Your Daily Polling Update for Wednesday, May 1, 2019
TRUMP JOB APPROVAL: AVERAGE 44%
Same as yesterday
RON’S COMMENT: Today’s average is based on five polls, ranging from 40% (Reuters) to 49% (Rasmussen). Without these two extremes, it would still be 44%…. President Trump’s disapproval rating averages 53% today (same as yesterday), which is 9 points higher than his approval rating.
NATIONAL: DEMOCRATIC NOMINATION
Among Democratic primary voters nationwide
Joe Biden: 38%
Elizabeth Warren: 12%
Bernie Sanders: 11%
Pete Buttigieg: 10%
Kamala Harris: 8%
Beto O’Rourke: 5%
Cory Booker: 2%
Amy Klobuchar: 1%
Julian Castro: 1%
Andrew Yang: 1%
Jay Inslee: 1%
Candidates with less than 1% not listed
RON’S COMMENT: This Quinnipiac poll shows Biden way out in front, a jump of 9 points since late March. It also finds Warren in second place, edging Sanders and Buttigieg. If the Sanders’ number is correct, it represents an 8-point decline for him since late March, when he was polling 19% in the previous Quinnipiac survey…. Poll internals indicate that Biden does best among moderates in his party. Warren leads among the most liberal Democrats (26%), with Biden (20%) and Sanders (19%) following. Interesting to note that Warren was polling only 10% among the most liberal Democrats in late March, so this is a big improvement for her. We will have to see if other polls show the same thing…. Higher income Democrats pick Biden first and Buttigieg second…. Also, Buttigieg is drawing 21% of voters who “lean Democratic” compared to 6% of those who are solid Democrats.
It appears that Biden’s announcement has served him well in multiple ways. He is voted “best leader” by 44% of Democrats in this poll, with Sanders and Warren tied at 11% each…. On policy, Biden is also first, but by a much smaller margin, with Warren and Sanders following…. Biden’s biggest strength is the perception that he has the best chance to beat Trump––56% of Democrats believe that to be true. All other candidates trail badly on this important metric.
NATIONAL: REPUBLICAN NOMINATION
Among Republican primary voters nationwide
Donald Trump: 84%
Bill Weld: 3%
Larry Hogan: 3%
RON’S COMMENT: This Quinnipiac poll shows Trump decimating his possible GOP rivals. Neither Weld nor Hogan get any support––as in zero––among the most conservative Republicans. Their only pocket of support, skimpy as it is, can be found among moderate Republicans, where Weld gets 8% and Hogan draws 6%.
GAY PRESIDENT?
Among voters nationwide
In general, would you say that you are open to electing a president who is a gay man, or wouldn’t you say that?
Yes/open: 70%
No: 23%
Don’t know: 7%
RON’S COMMENT: While 7 out of 10 voters are open to voting for a gay male presidential candidate––by party, it’s 46% of Republicans, 85% of Democrats and 76% of independents…. Women are slightly more open to doing so than men (72% vs. 69%). Voters under 35 are a good bit more open than those 65 and older (82% vs. 61%)…. However, another question in this poll finds that only 36% of all voters and 43% of Democrats believe the U.S. is “ready” to elect a gay man.
WEALTH TAX
Among voters nationwide
Do you support or oppose an annual wealth tax which would tax individuals 2% on any wealth over $50 million dollars?
Support: 60%
Oppose: 34%
RON’S COMMENT: Wonder why so many Democratic presidential candidates talk about taxing the rich? This poll shows why––82% of Democrats, compared to 32% of Republicans and 63% of Republicans, favor a wealth tax. The fact that nearly a third of Republicans favor a wealth tax is an indication of the size of the party’s populist economic base, which is considerable.
POLITICAL BOOKSHELF
DINNER IN CAMELOT: The Night America’s Greatest Scientists, Writers and Scholars Partied at the Kennedy White House by Joseph A. Esposito
Continuing their policy of highlighting the arts, music, and the learned fields, President and Mrs. Kennedy honored forty-nine Nobel Prize winners at the White House on April 29, 1962. The largest dinner of the Kennedy era, it included many distinguished Americans. Among them were J. Robert Oppenheimer; Linus Pauling—who picketed JFK outside the White House earlier in the day; Robert Frost, Pearl Buck; William and Rose Styron; James Baldwin; Katherine Anne Porter; John Glenn; Ralph Bunche; and Mary Welsh Hemingway, Ernest’s widow, who challenged Kennedy over his Cuba policy that night. It was a time when intellect and achievement were honored at the White House and civility prevailed. Published by Fore Edge/University Press of New England.
To purchase: https://www.amazon.com/Dinner-Camelot-Americas-Greatest-Scientists/dp/1512600121/ref=sr_1_fkmrnull_1?keywords=DINNER+AT+CAMELOT&qid=1556656341&s=gateway&sr=8-1-fkmrnull
SOURCES
Presidential job rating average based on recent nationwide polls.
NATIONAL: DEMOCRATIC NOMINATION, NATIONAL: REPUBLICAN NOMINATION,GAY PRESIDENT?, WEALTH TAX: Quinnipiac, April 26-29
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