Bernie Sanders tops Democratic field in national poll after Iowa

MANCHESTER, N.H. — Bernie Sanders is leading the Democratic field in a national poll taken after the Iowa caucuses.

The Quinnipiac University poll showed the Vermont senator with 25% support, topping the survey for the first time. He was followed by former Vice President Joe Biden at 17% and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg at 15%.

Biden dropped dramatically since the previous Quinnipiac poll on Jan. 28, when he had 26% and the lead. In that poll, Sanders was second with 21% and Bloomberg had 8%. (Bloomberg is the founder and majority owner of Bloomberg LP, the parent company of Bloomberg News.)

New @QuinnipiacPoll Democratic candidates lead @realDonaldTrump Trump in general election matchups:@MikeBloomberg /Trump 51-42%@BernieSanders /Trump 51-43%@JoeBiden /Trump 50-43%@amyklobuchar /Trump 49-43%@EWarren /Trump 48-44%@PeteButtigieg /Trump 47-43%

— Ali Velshi (@AliVelshi) February 10, 2020

Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren came in fourth in the February poll with 14%, followed by former South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg at 10% and Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar at 4%. No other candidate had more 2%.

Buttigieg emerged from the Feb. 3 Iowa caucuses with the most delegates, followed closely by Sanders and Warren. Biden came in fourth.

Sanders is also leading in New Hampshire polls ahead of the state’s primary on Tuesday.

Quinnipiac analyst Tim Malloy said Biden’s slide in the poll appears to be correlated with a similar slide in a poll question on electability.

“Clearly Biden’s fourth-place finish in Iowa has hurt the perception of what was his biggest strength — electability,” he said.

Here's how our polling averages are affected by that Quinnipiac poll. These are our "pure" averages, not the fancy version in our model, which is still trying to build in some guesses about the Iowa bounce.

(p.s. Bloomberg is not on the ballot in SC but some pollsters list him.) pic.twitter.com/VHL5C3oFtz

— Nate Silver (@NateSilver538) February 10, 2020

The survey of 665 Democratic and Democratic-leaning voters nationwide was conducted Feb. 5-9 and has a margin of error of 3.8 percentage points.