July 9 Poll Report

            Good morning everybody.   Seth Moulton was on the list of candidates to be polled yesterday—it is set up a week in advance—but he decided to quit the race in the middle of the poll.  He was predicted to poll at 12%, and he was polling at 12% in the early going, but then once he pulled out of the race people stopped voting for him and he dropped to 8%.  Despite this, Bernie Sanders, the big fish in the pool, was unable to meet his expectations for the poll, which sort of tells you how Bernie’s campaign is going, from the standpoint of my Twitter companions.  This is the summary of yesterday’s poll:

            Bernie won, but Michael Bennet is the guy who really won, the candidate who beat expectations and thus moves up a little bit in the standings.   Only two candidates have moved up on down by more than five points since yesterday:  Michael Bennet being up 12 points, and Bernie Sanders being down 8.   These are the updated standings:

            Eric Swalwell leaves us with a Support Score of 85 (85/100^th of one percent); I will try not to mention his name again. 

            Since yesterday, Bill de Blasio and John Delaney have both qualified for the Green List, which means that their Support Scores are up 25% in the last 30 days.   There is something really interesting happening there, which I wish that I had written a week ago, but a week ago I wasn’t sure that it was a real thing rather than a trick of the numbers, so I held off.

            From May 27 until June 27, there was a very clear trend in these polls that support was leaving the lesser candidates and moving toward the stronger candidates.  I measure every day the standard deviation of the Support Scores, which are the numbers in the chart above.  If the leaders in the field pull away from the bottom of the field, the standard deviation increases. 

            From May 27 until June 27, the standard deviation was increasing almost every day.  The standard deviation went from 316 on May 27 to 443 on June 27.  Not coincidentally, June 27 was the date of the first Democratic debate.

            Since the debates, this trend has reversed itself in a fairly dramatic fashion.  People are now turning AWAY from the leaders, and looking more carefully at the other candidates. 

            Two weeks ago, an actual majority of those candidates with Support Scores of 150 or lower were on the Gray List, meaning that their support was dropping significantly.   Now, only one candidate with a Support Score less than 300 is losing support, that one being Howard Schultz, who is not on the campaign trail following back surgery.   Not only have Delaney and de Blasio edged forward enough to be listed in green, but Tim Ryan qualified for the Green List yesterday and is up a couple of points more this morning.   Marianne Williamson is up another 3 points this morning to another new high for her; it is the 13^th time since May 12 that her Support Score has reached a new high (31-37-38-46-52-55-56-59-69-72-74-75-76-79.)  Not suggesting that she is a serious candidate yet or that she will be, but she keeps gaining a foot a day. 

            While the candidates at the bottom are edging up, the candidates at the top are not making any real progress toward consolidating their support.  Elizabeth Warren, who was gaining followers almost every day from late April until June 27, has the lowest Support Score this morning that she has had in two weeks, not that I think she is actually losing supporters, but she isn’t gaining them now, either.  Pete Buttigieg’s Support Score is off a little more than 10% in the last month, and Joe Biden’s more than 20%.  Kamala Harris has picked up a little bit of support, just a few points, but although the media is talking about her as if she has hit a home run in the debate, my polls are not really reflecting that; it’s more like she hit a single and was thrown out trying to stretch it to a double.  OK; she hasn’t been thrown out.  She’s up 10% since the June 28 debate.   Elizabeth Warren from April 28 until June 27 was increasing her Support Score at a rate of 1.75% per day, which is about twice Harris’ rate of increase—and sustained that for two months. 

            Bernie Harris loses support every time we poll him.  Beto O’Rourke is dead in the water, at least for now, and he has really nice momentum compared to Cory Booker.  Michael Bennet is moving up; Tulsi Gabbard is moving up; Jay Inslee is moving up.  Andrew Yang and Julian Castro are the hottest candidates in the mix at the moment.   The perceived leaders are just NOT adding support, at this time. 

            Thanks for reading.