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It's been pointed out to me (hat tip to dolphin_of_france) that some recent polling puts Warren ahead of Biden in the Democratic primary voting intention.

How sudden was this change? How much [of this] change happened in the time proximity of the recent Trump-Zelensky phone call disclosures?

Interestingly, as CNN noted about Warren (on Sep 23):

She has also been very outspoken on another issue supported by approximately 70% of Democrats: Impeaching Trump. Warren was the first major presidential candidate to call for impeaching the President back in April, just days after Robert Mueller's report was released. And on Friday after allegations were reported that Trump spoke to the Ukrainian President in July and pressured him to investigate Biden and Biden's son Hunter in an obvious effort to get dirt on Biden, Warren went a step further. She took to Twitter slamming Democrats in Congress for failing to act [...]

CNN then contrasts that with Biden's more cautious approach.

As it's been pointed out to me below, I should also be asking how reliable/relevant these polls are. Apparently they are state-level polls.

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  • 3
    Some polling indicated this shift a couple of days before the above news broke. – K Dog Sep 26 '19 at 17:13
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    And other polls from the same time period show Biden with a double digit lead. I'd argue that it's much too early to say if anything has changed significantly in the Warren-Biden race. – divibisan Sep 26 '19 at 17:14
  • @divibisan: interesting that they can have such large differences. Is it because they are state-level polls? I would accept a frame challenge answer that explains (to the extent that's possible) what's going on. – Fizz Sep 26 '19 at 17:16
  • It's never a good idea to put too much stock in a single poll. Once a few more polls come out we'll be able to see if this is an outlier or the start of a trend. – Arcanist Lupus Sep 26 '19 at 19:11
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The Real Clear Polling Averages are a useful guide here.

The poll in question is a Quinnipiac University poll of 561 registered voters nationwide. (Technically the poll was of 1337 registered voters, but the question on the Democratic Primary was only asked to the 561 respondents who identified as Democrats or Independents who leaned Democratic.)

This poll shows Warren with 27% support compared to Biden's 25% support. Within Quinnipiac's polls, it represents a rapid jump in Warren's support from their last poll at the end of August:

                     DEMOCRATS/DEMOCRATIC LEANERS..........................................
                     Sep 25  Aug 28  Aug 06  Jul 29  Jul 02  Jun 11  May 21  Apr 30  Mar 28
                     2019    2019    2019    2019    2019    2019    2019    2019    2019

Biden                25      32      32      34      22      30      35      38      29
Sanders              16      15      14      11      13      19      16      11      19
O'Rourke              2       1       2       2       1       3       2       5      12
Harris                3       7       7      12      20       7       8       8       8
Warren               27      19      21      15      14      15      13      12       4

However, there is not enough resolution here to determine when the jump occured or to attribute it to any specific effect. Data for this poll was collected from September 19th to 23rd, so it is likely too early to see much effect from the Ukraine scandal, as it was just starting to blow up at the end of the polling period.

Another poll from Economist/YouGov from September 22nd - 24th also shows Warren 1% ahead of Biden. However the Economist/YouGov has long showed weaker Biden leads than other polls, so this doesn't represent a real shift either:

             Biden  Warren
9/22 - 9/24:    26      27
9/14 - 9/17:    26      21
9/8  - 9/10:    26      26
9/1  - 9/3 :    26      22

At the same time, another poll released by Morning Consult with data collected from September 16-22nd shows Biden up by 12%. So, I'd argue that it's still a bit early to say if anything significant has changed in the Biden-Warren race and definitely much too early to say if this scandal will hurt Biden.

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  • I really appreciate your answer, but I'm holding off ticking the accept for now as not to discourage any more up-to-date answer in the next few days. – Fizz Sep 26 '19 at 17:59
  • @Fizz That's fine. Since my answer is basically "it's too early to say", it makes sense to hold off on accepting it. I'm suspect that the next few weeks are going to be very interesting – divibisan Sep 26 '19 at 18:02

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