This was one of the first times during an election year that Biden was clearly running ahead of Hillary Clinton’s 2016 speed in the fight against Trump.
In terms of high quality individual polls, you don’t need to look any further than Fox News. Clinton trailed Trump with 3 points in a
Fox News poll came out four years ago between May 16 – May 23. Now, Biden is up 8 points in the same poll.
Indeed, Clinton also uses high-quality direct telephone
ABC News / Washington Post poll four years ago it was finished between May 16 – May 23.
Biden in particular has not participated in a direct interview poll so far this year.
Even though Clinton will regain some of his profits in June 2016, the fact that the race got very close at this point four years ago is an indication that voters are rather nervous. This shows that under the right circumstances, Clinton could lose nationally, or, at the very least, that Trump could become close enough nationally to win in an election college.
Biden’s superiority, of course, is the most stable of all time. His superiority never fell to a point or anywhere near. It’s been consistent at or right around 6 points, like this week. If you make a 95% confidence interval around the 2016 and 2020 individual polls, the 2016 race is about 1.5 times more volatile to date.
But it’s not only margins that are important to check. Look at the percentage of votes.
The reason why Biden’s advantage is so vast compared to Clinton’s is because he ran a little more than 5 points ahead of where Clinton was in terms of percentage of votes. Biden is slightly greater than 48%, while Clinton is slightly less than 43%.
Even when Clinton’s leadership widened in June, he never reached 48% in the polls. He had to take on more voters who were late in deciding that their leaders felt safe than Biden.
Interestingly, Trump actually drew around the same percentage of votes in the poll as at the end of May 2016. Without rounding, he only walked around 0.4 points worse.
There are many voters who have not yet voted or a third party at the end of May 2016. Without rounding, Biden and Trump add up to 89.5% of the vote on average. Clinton and Trump increased to 84.9%.
Keep in mind, only a few of the polls conducted four years ago were completed between May 16 – May 23 including Libertarian Gary Johnson as an option. Focusing only on those who did vote showed Clinton and Trump deadlocked just under 39%. That is, Trump is tied to Clinton even because he has a lower share of votes than he has in the 2020 poll now. Major party candidates together add up to 77% to the poll asking about Johnson.
When elections have not been decided and third parties are high in the polls, that means greater uncertainty. Third-party candidates tend to deflate during the election year. Combining third-party and undecided voter blocks gives large party candidates larger groups to take voters from.
In other words, Trump had more room four years ago to take over. And, in fact, Trump won over the strength of his support among voters who voted last month.
More Americans have said that they are willing to vote for Biden in the most likely electoral battle than they ever did against Clinton at any point in the last six months of the campaign.
The obvious question moving forward is whether Biden can follow suit. So far, he and his basement campaign face challenges.
