Poll: Biden would enter race as most popular Democrat
While he hasn’t yet said whether he will enter the 2016 presidential field, a new poll finds Vice President Biden is the most popular Democrat looking at the race.
Forty percent of Americans have a positive impression of Biden, according to an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll released Monday, while 28 percent have a negative one.
Longtime Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton is viewed favorably by a similar margin, 39 percent, but is viewed negatively by more Americans than Biden is, at 47 percent.
Sen. Bernie Sanders, Clinton’s primary foil in the race so far, is viewed positively by 32 percent of Americans, while 22 percent hold a negative view of the Vermont Independent.
Clinton is still considered a favorite in the race, with 42 percent support of Democratic primary voters, followed by Sanders at 35 percent and Biden at 17 percent.
Without Biden in the mix, Clinton leads Sanders 53 to 38 percent in the poll.
On the GOP side, retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson and former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina are also viewed positively by a net percentage of Americans, at 8 and 7 percent, respectively.
However, real estate tycoon Donald Trump is much more unpopular: 25 percent of Americans view him positively in the poll compared to 58 percent who view him negatively.
The survey found Biden leading in general election matchups with Trump (21 points), Carson (8 points), former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (8 points) and Fiorina (6 points).
The poll found Clinton leading Bush by 1 point and Trump by 10 points but narrowly trailing Carson and Fiorina by 1 point each.
The survey of 1,000 U.S. adults was conducted Sept. 20-24 via landlines and cellphones with a margin of error of 3.1 points. The margin for 256 Democratic primary voters is 6.13 points.