Biden has not publicly indicated interest in doing so. He points to polling showing that he’s still very much within striking distance of victory. Those seeking to oust him point to polling showing that other candidates are, too, and point out that other candidates might be able to prosecute the case against Donald Trump as Election Day nears.
The race remains a referendum on Trump as new polling from CBS News, conducted by YouGov, shows. Only about a quarter of those who plan to vote for Biden say that they are doing so because they like him, compared to about two-thirds of Trump voters who like Trump. Half of Biden voters simply oppose Trump — which presumably would mean that their votes would transfer over to another non-Trump Democrat.
The challenge for those seeking to dump Biden — or, more practically, get him to withdraw from the race — is that it’s not clear who might replace him who 1) obviously would fare better on Election Day and 2) wouldn’t turn off part of that quarter of his support who really likes him. Countless Democrats are arguing that “another candidate could beat Biden,” but many of them already have a candidate in mind. If Biden does step aside, the mess simply moves into a new realm, with party infighting not about whether Biden should run but who should run in his stead.
The cleanest transition, then, would be for Biden to step aside and endorse Vice President Harris. Polling conducted by YouGov for The Economist shows that such a move would meet with his party’s approval — not his party’s exultation, certainly, but neither would Democrats recoil from it.
Three-quarters of Democrats say they’d approve of Harris replacing Biden should the president stand down. Just under half say they’d strongly approve.
But notice how unsupportive independents are. Republicans are unsupportive, too, but that’s mostly knee-jerk opposition, as we’ll see in a second. The chart above shows the difference between Biden being replaced in the abstract and his being replaced by someone specific. About half of independents told YouGov in the same poll that they thought Biden should definitely or probably step aside. Only 3 in 10 said they’d approve of Harris replacing him.
As that poll suggests, that poll doesn’t bring the Democrats any substantial gain in enthusiasm, at least at the moment. YouGov asked respondents to indicate how favorably they viewed Biden, Harris and Trump. Biden and Harris had similar numbers from Democrats, with less than half saying they viewed either Democrat very favorably. Among Republicans, by contrast, more than two-thirds viewed Trump very favorably.
Part of Trump’s support is certainly rooted in his nine years as the party’s preferred pick for president and his effectively sidelining critics over that time. (This was very evident at this week’s convention.) The point, though, is that Democrats look at Biden and Harris and respond about the same way.
We can see that in YouGov’s question about whether the candidates care about people like them. Half of Democrats said, yes, Biden does a lot, as does Harris. Three-quarters said both candidates cared about people like them at least some. Nearly three-quarters of Republicans said Trump cares about people like them a lot, though his overall numbers weren’t much different from Biden’s.
YouGov also asked respondents if they thought Harris was more likely to win than Biden and, if she did, whether she’d be a better or worse president.
Among Democrats, about equal numbers said that Harris would be more likely to win, more likely to lose or likely to fare as well in the election as Biden. They were more likely to say, though, that she’d be a better president than that she’d be a worse one.
Note the Republican numbers here, to the earlier point. Republicans are really confident she’d fare worse against Trump. And they’re really confident — despite years of falsely insisting that Biden is completely unfit for his position and/or under the control of nefarious outsiders — that Harris would still somehow be a worse chief executive. It is hard to read this as anything other than knee-jerk hostility.
It’s those Democrat numbers that matter for the current debate. If Biden were to step aside, the natural replacement would be Harris. If that happened, though, their party is generally uncertain whether it would make a positive difference. Many of those who think she would fare worse probably have their own preferred non-Biden, non-Harris candidate in mind, someone they’re sure could outperform both Biden and Harris. The number of those candidates who end up as the party’s nominee ranges from zero to one, meaning a lot of disappointed, pessimistic Democrats regardless.
The YouGov poll’s essential contribution to the discussion is this: There’s no easy answer.
