Latest Polling Is Good News for Joe Biden – It’s horse race season and that means the polling for the 2024 presidential campaign is heating up.
Voters are curious about where their candidates stand in head-to-head matchups. We keep our eyes on these numbers and analyze them thoroughly for you. Let’s take a look at one of the latest surveys for President Joe Biden, former President Donald Trump, and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, along with others.
Joe Biden Improves
The first new poll measures the approval rating for Joe Biden after his State of the Union address. The White House should be pleased with these numbers. According to an NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll, Biden had a 49 percent approval rating with registered voters.
This Is a Heck Of A Lot Better Than Biden’s Low Point
Not bad, considering he has been down as low as 36 percent which was measured last July. This is his highest score since March of 2022. The growth is coming from Democrats who are seeing a defiant Biden take the fight to Republicans as evidenced by his spunky (for Biden) speech to the country.
The president scores an 83 percent favorability rating with Democrats and Democrat-leaners.
However, Biden is still lagging with independents who only gave him 36 percent approval. That needs to be fixed before he can be successful in returning to the White House in 2024.
Does This Mean Joe Biden Announces His Run?
These numbers, should White House internal polling find the same levels, will give confidence to the Biden team that their guy is ready to officially announce he is running again. So far, the re-election campaign has stalled, likely because they wanted to wait until the president is in a position of strength this spring.
This has some Democrats wringing their hands in anticipation and will hopefully put speculation to rest that Biden might step down.
They Are Not Sure If Biden Should Pass the Torch to Someone Else
For months, polls that asked Democrat voters whether they would prefer someone else on the ballot. Sometimes only 37 percent of Democrats support Biden to run again. But these people often have no idea who they would want to run in his place. This is natural for some to wonder about Biden’s age and his difficulty with the media and on the stump when it comes to communicating effectively at 80.
Putting together a string of good polling numbers could cement in their minds that Biden is the go-to candidate who is primed for re-election. Fifty percent of those surveyed in the NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll said they are happy with Biden on the ballot.
Trump Is Having Polling Problems
As for Trump, the poll delivered mediocre news. The majority of respondents said they would like someone new to be the party’s nominee. Fifty-four percent said Trump would not be the candidate they favor most.
The poll teased out something interesting. Those with college degrees making more than $50,000 a year and those with younger children are more likely to view that someone besides Trump would be better.
People with lower incomes and only high school degrees plus voters who live in rural areas are more likely to support Trump.
Getting to Know Ron DeSantis
This also showed that DeSantis has a solid approval rating in this survey at 66 percent while a high number of people, 23 percent, are unsure of the Florida governor. This means DeSantis has yet to convince the voters who know little about him. It also signifies he has a high upside if he can meet more Republicans on the campaign trail if he runs.
Haley and Pence Have a Long Way to Go
Other candidates and potential candidates trail DeSantis in approval such as Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina and UN ambassador, who has nearly 46 percent of voters unsure of her. Meanwhile, former Vice President Mike Pence only has a 51 percent favorability rating.
To be sure, this is only one poll, but likely one that is being studied by multiple campaigns and those who are on the team doing initial work toward an announcement such as DeSantis and Pence.
Donald Trump Already Has It In For DeSantis
For Joe Biden, it shows that he needs to keep the Democrat base in his corner and make a better case to Independents. Trump still has trouble with voters with college degrees and high earners who are supporting DeSantis at the moment.
Trump has already started insulting DeSantis by calling him names such as “RINO and globalist.”
These are epithets that rile up the Trump base, no matter that they are not true. DeSantis would say that he is highly conservative and devotes almost all of his time to domestic and not foreign policy. Pence and Haley need to placate voters who have qualms about them.
The horse race is on. We will be sure to deliver the latest in polling and analysis so you can better understand the presidential race and see how candidates rise or fall in the public eye.
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Author Expertise and Experience: Serving as 19FortyFive’s Defense and National Security Editor, Dr. Brent M. Eastwood is the author of Humans, Machines, and Data: Future Trends in Warfare. He is an Emerging Threats expert and former U.S. Army Infantry officer. You can follow him on Twitter @BMEastwood. He holds a Ph.D. in Political Science and Foreign Policy/ International Relations.
