Vice President Harris is running closer to former President Trump than President Biden is, according to a new poll.
The CNN poll released Tuesday found that 45 percent of registered voters would support Harris in a hypothetical match-up with Trump. She is 2 percentage points behind the former president, who received 47 percent support in a head-to-head contest with Harris. Five percent of respondents said they would choose someone else.
On the other hand, Biden trailed Trump by 6 points in the poll. Trump is leading with 49 percent support in a match-up with the president, while Biden received 43 percent support. Another 4 percent said they would vote for someone else.
The poll was conducted after Biden’s shaky performance in last week’s debate, which has prompted concerns from within the Democrat Party over whether he is the best candidate they can put forward. Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas) on Tuesday became the first House Democrat to publicly call on Biden to remove himself from the ticket, while numerous editorial boards across the country have urged the same.
The debate has thrown Harris into the national spotlight as she navigates defending Biden and his ability to serve while some people have called on her to replace him. Former Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio) said Tuesday that Harris should replace the president at the top of the ticket, adding that she will “destroy Trump in debate.”
Despite these worries and calls to drop out of the race, the Biden campaign and its surrogates have maintained that the president is still the best candidate to beat Trump. Biden’s team has tried to quell concerns about his debate, emphasizing that Biden will not be leaving the race.
The poll also found that 75 percent of registered voters polled said Democrats would have a better shot of winning the White House with someone else as their candidate. This includes 56 percent of Democrats and Democrat-leaning independent voters.
The poll was conducted among 1,274 respondents between June 28 and 30. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.
