(CN) – With more than 500 days left until the 2020 U.S. presidential election, former Vice President Joe Biden is the clear frontrunner among Democrats to take on President Donald Trump, according to a Quinnipiac poll Tuesday.
At 23 candidates, the Democratic race is flush with contenders including U.S. Senators Kamala Harris of California, Cory Booker of New Jersey and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, former U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke of Texas, and many more.
While U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont is an Independent, he is running for the presidency as a Democrat and is a distant second to Biden.
Biden launched his campaign in April and is the top pick for 35 percent of Democrats, according to the independent poll.
Sanders trails at 16%, followed by Warren at 13%, Harris at 8% and 5% for South Bend, Indiana, mayor Pete Buttigieg. The rest of the candidates do not break the 3% mark.
For many candidates, voters polled say they don’t know enough about them to vote for them. That includes the 70% of voters who said they did not know enough about former HUD secretary Julian Castro or current Washington state Governor Jay Inslee, who saw 77% of voters saying the same despite his climate change platform.
While the May Quinnipiac study did not tackle any policy issues, an April 2019 poll from Monmouth University found Democrats are rallying behind health care and the environment.
As for Trump, the Quinnipiac poll found 54% of the 1,078 voters polled said they would “definitely” not vote for Trump, 2% more than the April 30 poll. Another 31% said they will “definitely” vote for him and 12% said they would “consider voting for him.”
Voters who said they’ll definitely vote for Trump include 76% Republicans, 3% Democrats, and 21% who said they were independent voters, according to the poll. The breakdown of voters who said they won’t vote for Trump includes 10% of Republicans, 94% Democrats and 54% of independent voters.
Trump’s favorability rating skews negative at 38%-57% despite positive opinions on the U.S. economy. Just over half of voters said they are better off financially than they were in 2016, with 21% saying they are worse off and 23% saying they’re in the same place. Nearly half approve of Trump’s handling of the economy, but he gets dinged on foreign policy, trade and policies with Iran with a 37%-47% negative approval.
“The nation’s economy is pretty darn good and President Donald Trump’s approval numbers are pretty darn awful,” said Tim Malloy, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Poll. “So what to make of the good news, bad news mashup and how to correct it? For the moment, the disparity leaves the president on shaky re-election ground.”
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