A Rare Nevada Poll & A Steady Race in NH, CA and Nationally- Today in Primary Polling

THE STATES

New Hampshire

Public Policy Polling (Fivethirtyeight rating B-)

Clinton 47

Sanders 44

O’Malley 3

Not too much change on the margin from their last poll (released in early December) when Clinton led 44-42. Both candidates improved as undecideds fell, though. True to form, PPP released all sorts of good information in the crosstabs.

Clinton leads Sanders 55-36 among Democrats, but Sanders has an impressive 59-29 advantage among Independents who plan on participating in the Democratic caucus. Clinton’s strength on the ideological spectrum is among Somewhat Liberal voters, where she leads 52-41.

Sanders leads among Very Liberal voters by 1, Moderate voters by 3, and somewhat conservative voters by 8.

There is a massive gender gap in New Hampshire- Clinton leads among women by 13 points (51-38) while trailing among men by 8 (42-50).

The candidates are basically dead even among voters 18-45 (44-47) and 46-65 (45-44), but Clinton has a dominant lead among voters 65+ (54-36).

PPP points out the same thing that others (myself included) have said about how the Republican race will impact the eventual outcome in New Hampshire-

 “Clinton is dominant with the Democratic establishment, but Sanders is proving to be more appealing to people outside the party. It may come down to how many of those non-Democrats he can get to come out and choose to vote in the Democratic race rather than the Republican one that’s drawn a lot more interest.” 

Nevada

Gravis (Fivethirtyeight rating C)

Clinton 50

Sanders 27

O’Malley 1

Gravis is an awful pollster, but we’re throwing them on the pile like we do with everything else. Nevada has been criminally underpolled the entire cycle. The last Gravis poll was from mid July, and Sanders, unsurprisingly, has improved since then when the race was 55-18. That said, the only other poll in the meantime came from CNN/ORC and had the race at 50-34 in October. We can pretty definitely say that Clinton has the advantage here, but the dearth of polling and the nature of the Nevada caucuses makes it more likely that we’ll be surprised here on caucus night than the other early states.

California

Field Poll (Fivethirtyeight rating A+)

Clinton 46

Sanders 35

O’Malley 1

The Field Poll is the gold standard in California polling (much like Selzer is for Iowa) and they find a race that hasn’t really changed there since early October when they found a 47-35 race. California comes very late in the primary process and if the race is still contested at that point it will be a very different race than what we’re seeing today anyways, but it is somewhat interesting that three months has seen no change in a major and diverse population in a state dominated by Democrats.

NATIONAL

NBC/SurveyMonkey (Unrated by Fivethirtyeight)

Clinton 53

Sanders 36

O’Malley 2

The poll represents an improvement for both candidates over their last poll from mid-November when they had the race at 49-33. Clinton is up four, Sanders is up three, and O’Malley has doubled his support. This poll has tended to show a closer race than others AND has shown Clinton below 50 in every poll but one since September. While a one point improvement on her margin over Sanders is not particularly big news, moving back to a majority of support is definitely a good sign for Clinton in this unfriendly poll.

Ipsos/Reuters Update (Fivethirtyeight rating C+)

The daily tracking poll has released some more days covering the period after the last “official” release. Keep in mind that these are not the results of the daily polling, but each is the average of the five days preceding it.

Well, it has been a while since some Sanders supporters took their early December release that showed a 51-36 race as a “harbinger” of things to come, but I think we can continue to safely relegate this poll to the bottom of the pile. While it hasn’t been as swingy recently as it was earlier in the cycle, it’s pretty unlikely that anything happened over the New Year to swing the race even as much as we’re seeing here. Over the last month, Clinton is up about 10 and Sanders is down about 5, but that isn’t saying much from this poll. Just included as another piece of info for the pile.

THE AVERAGES

All numbers are Clinton-Sanders-O’Malley and rounded to the nearest percent.

New Hampshire

RCP: 45-48-2 (Sanders +3)

Pollster: 48-49-3 (Sanders +1)

Nevada

RCP: 50-31-1 (Clinton +19)

Pollster: Not tracking Nevada

California

RCP: 43-30-1 (Clinton +13)

Pollster: 46-35-1 (Clinton +11)

National

RCP: 53-32-4 (Clinton +21)

Pollster: 55-33-2 (Clinton +22)