April 18, 2016

Morning Line: Clinton, Sanders tied

Based on the average of recent polls:

Clinton leads Sanders by 3 points nationally, a statistical tie and her closest lead

Sanders would beat Trump by 15 points while Clinton would lead by 10, Their best leads yet were 21 and 17.

Sanders would beat Cruz by 5, 2 points better than Clinton. Their best leads were 9 for Sanders and 6 for Clinton

Trump leads Cruz by 17. 8 is the closest to date

In electoral votes, Democrats have 139 firm or leaning towards the party, the GOP has 77.

In Senate races, Democrats stand to pick up 1 seat and could pick up 4 more, enough for the GOP to lose its majority

2 comments:

JohnHerald said...

Current polls mean nothing. Sanders has had no Republican opposition to this point, meaning the political right has yet to attack him. Clinton on the other hand has been under attack by the right for 25 years. So where are Sanders' polls going to be at after two months of a concerted campaign against his proposals to raise taxes, increase entitlements and replace our current health care system? Worse, where will his numbers be when the right starts spending hundreds of millions to portray him as a job killer, as anti-capitalist, as somebody who wants to change the United States into the economic disaster known as socialist Europe? And you seriously think Sanders' poll numbers will stand up?

Richard said...

John is absolutely right about the meaninglessness of current polls of hypothetical head-to-head horse races. Polls are nothing more than a snapshot of a given moment in time. But campaigns are by definition intensely dialectical encounters, with each side attempting to gain the advantage. The public knows almost nothing about Sanders, while people have been bashing away at Clinton's alleged weaknesses for decades. There is very little new we are likely to learn about Clinton if she wins the nomination. But Sanders is a blank slate, which the corporate super pacs are prepared to spend hundreds of millions of dollars filling in our ignorance with what will undoubtedly be a tsunami of vileness. There is every reason to think that Sanders head-to-head polling numbers are very soft, with lots of room for downside movement.