This poll was done before Kamala Harris exited the primary race.
(Chris Keller / Los Angeles Times)
WASHINGTON — The Democratic presidential contest in California remains extremely fluid — but not enough, at least so far, to provide an opening for Michael Bloomberg, who entered the race two weeks ago and was banking on winning big in the delegate-rich state, a new poll for the Los Angeles Times has found.
The survey by the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies found that both Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts — the commanding front-runner in a September California poll — and former Vice President Joe Biden have lost ground among the state’s likely Democratic primary voters over the last two months.
That erosion has benefited Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who narrowly tops the primary field, and Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Ind., who doubled his support since the September poll.
“Voters are struggling and not sticking with their candidates,” he said. “They are moving around from candidate to candidate.”
The upshot of the poll is that the field’s most liberal candidates, Warren and Sanders, are in a statistical tie for first place. The leading candidates making a more moderate pitch, Biden and Buttigieg, are lagging and essentially tied for third place.
Sanders is in the nominal lead, as the first-choice pick of 24%; Warren is the first pick of 22%. That is a big change from September, when she led the field with 29%.
More good news, Bloomberg did poorly.
The 2020 California Democratic primary will take place on Tuesday, March 3, 2020, much earlier than in past Democratic Primaries.
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