Democratic Primary with Joe Biden
President Biden is in charge! At least that is the case when it comes to a hypothetical Democratic Primary. The president remains ahead of the pack in his quest for a second term where he received 41% among surveyed respondents. The former first lady, Michelle Obama, came in second with 16%, even though there is no indication she would run. The current Vice President, Kamala Harris, was the only other candidate to receive double digit support with 11%.
Vermont's Senator, Bernie Sanders (8%), did not perform well, and out of the remaining names was the only other candidate to receive a number within the margin of error.
Other names, such as, First Lady Jill Biden (3%), California Governor Gavin Newsom (3%), former gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams (3%), Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren (3%), and someone else (4%) did not register high on the list of potential Democratic candidates.
Joe Biden held a significant lead over his rivals among most subgroups, but there were instances where Michelle Obama cut into Biden's lead. This was most evident among younger voters aged 18-24 (Biden leads 28% to 25%) and 18-29 (Biden leads 33% to 20%), Generation Z (Biden leads 28% to 25%), and small city voters (Obama leads 29% to 24%).
As of right now and based on the current numbers, President Biden for his part held his own with most Democratic voters and will most likely be the nominee if he (or the party) decides he will run again in 2024. Of notice was Biden's performance among: voters living in large cities (44%), suburbanites (43%), the West region (51%), voters aged 30-49 and 65+ (both 46%), and men (51%).
Democratic Primary without Joe Biden
In the event Joe Biden were to bow out of the 2024 Democratic Primary and not pursue reelection, the candidate to carry the torch would be former first lady Michelle Obama (21%), if she decided to pursue this avenue, while Kamala Harris (19%) is hot on her designer heels. The next most popular candidate, who also garnered double digit support, was Hillary Clinton (11%). After that depressing revelation, the list of candidates reads in the following order: Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders (8%), First Lady Jill Biden (7%), California Gov. Gavin Newsom (5%), former gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams (5%), Senator Elizabeth Warren (4%), while NYC Mayor Eric Adams came in last place with only 1%. Someone else received 7% and not sure received 11%.
When it came to demographics, a hypothetical Michelle Obama candidacy had the most crossover appeal. She appealed to Generation Z, beating Harris 29% to 8%, but First Lady Jill Biden was also popular as she received 18% among the youngest respondents. Millennials were split between Harris and Michelle Obama (both receiving 23%), while surprisingly, Hillary Clinton received 13% among Millennials. The former first lady did better than the vice President with Generation X; Michelle Obama beats Kamala Harris 27% to 20%. The oldest voters, Baby Boomers thought Harris was a better choice than Michelle Obama, 19% to 13%. Minorities were more in favor of the former first lady than the current vice president. Hispanics favored Michelle Obama 18% to 13% and African Americans favored Obama 29% to 19% over Harris.
Where voters lived also presented a two-way race between Obama and Harris. Large city voters were statistically split between Harris (24%) and Obama (22%), while medium sized city voters favored Obama 19% to 15% over Harris. Small city voters were prone to support a potential Michelle Obama candidacy by ten percentage point, 25% to 15%, and suburban voters also slightly favored Michelle Obama over Harris, 22% to 18%. Interestingly, rural voters preferred Vice President Harris 20% to 15% over Michelle Obama.
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Zogby Analytics Poll Methodology
Likely Democratic Primary Voters
5/23/22 - 5/24/22
Zogby Analytics conducted an online survey of 554 likely Democratic Primary voters in the US.
Using internal and trusted interactive partner resources, thousands of adults were randomly invited to participate in this interactive survey. Each invitation is password coded and secure so that one respondent can only access the survey one time.
Using information based on census data, voter registration figures, CIA fact books and exit polls, we use complex weighting techniques to best represent the demographics of the population being surveyed. Weighted variables may include age, race, gender, region, party, education, and religion. The party breakdown for this survey is as follows: 38% Democrat, 38% Republican and 24% Independent/unaffiliated.
Based on a confidence interval of 95%, the margin of error for 554 is +/- 4.2 percentage points. This means that all other things being equal, the identical survey repeated will have results within the margin of error 95 times out of 100.
Subsets of the data have a larger margin of error than the whole data set. As a rule we do not rely on the validity of very small subsets of the data especially sets smaller than 50-75 respondents. At that subset we can make estimations based on the data, but in these cases the data is more qualitative than quantitative.
Additional factors can create error, such as question wording and question order.
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About Zogby Analytics:
Zogby Analytics is respected nationally and internationally for its opinion research capabilities. Since 1984, Zogby has empowered clients with powerful information and knowledge critical for making informed strategic decisions.
The firm conducts multi-phased opinion research engagements for banking and financial services institutions, insurance companies, hospitals and medical centers, retailers and developers, religious institutions, cultural organizations, colleges and universities, IT companies and Federal agencies. Zogby's dedication and commitment to excellence and accuracy are reflected in its state-of-the-art opinion research capabilities and objective analysis and consultation.