November Iowa State poll finds Buttigieg in the lead
Presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg at a rally in the Scheman Building on Oct. 16. When asked if America was ready for a gay president, Buttigieg recalled even after publicly coming out, Buttigieg said he secured 80 percent of the votes in his 2015 mayoral re-election bid.
November 21, 2019
The rise of Pete Buttigieg among Iowa Democratic caucusgoers has received another supporting data point, according to Iowa State’s most recent poll of likely caucusgoers.
In the latest Iowa State poll of likely Iowa Democratic caucusgoers released Thursday, Buttigieg took the lead in the state, mirroring other polls showing him taking the lead in Iowa. In the RealClearPolitics polling average of likely Iowa caucusgoers, Buttigieg now has a lead in the state of more than 5 percent.
In Iowa State’s poll conducted by Civiqs, Buttigieg took the lead from Elizabeth Warren, who is now second in the poll and in the RealClearPolitics polling average. Buttigieg has the support of 26 percent of likely Iowa Democratic caucusgoers, according to the Iowa State poll. Warren has the support of 19 percent, followed by Bernie Sanders with 18 percent, Joe Biden with 12 percent and Amy Klobuchar with 5 percent. No other candidate has more than 5 percent support, according to the poll.
David Peterson, professor of political science at Iowa State, said in a news release Buttigieg has received mostly positive attention while Warren has been scrutinized over the past month since the last Iowa State poll was conducted.
“A little over 60% of the people who supported Warren in October still support her now, and those who switched went to Buttigieg,” Peterson said in the news release.
Buttigieg is the third candidate to lead the RealClearPolitics polling average of Democratic candidates during the campaign for the 2020 Iowa caucuses, after Biden and Warren had previously led the polling average.
“What this tells me, is that there is a segment of Iowans backing the candidate getting the most positive coverage,” Peterson said in the news release. “If we start seeing more scrutiny of Buttigieg, then his lead might prove to be temporary as well.”
The Iowa State poll conducted by Civiqs has a sample size of 614 likely Democratic caucusgoers. The poll took place online between Friday and Tuesday, before the Democratic presidential debate on Wednesday. The poll was conducted among selected Civiqs research panel members, and has a margin of error of 4.9 percent at the 95 percent confidence level, according to a write-up accompanying the poll.
