When President Biden speaks at the Democratic National Convention, he will do so against a backdrop of overwhelming optimism among his party’s base about his presidency.
In fact, Democrats across the country are more positive about Biden’s presidency today than they were in March, when he was still running for re-election, with three out of four Democrats describing his presidency as “excellent” or “good.”
But these positive assessments hardly extend beyond the Democratic Party: Voters as a whole, including most independents and an overwhelming number of Republicans, tend to judge his presidency negatively—describe it as either “mediocre” or “bad.”
What does this mean for Harris?
There is some correlation between opinion of Biden’s presidency and support for Vice President Kamala Harris.
It is perhaps no surprise that likely voters who view Biden’s presidency as “excellent” or “good” almost invariably vote for Harris.
And those who believe President Biden has done a “bad” job are supporting former President Donald Trump in large numbers.
But what about voters who are not entirely satisfied with Biden’s presidency so far, but who do not have extremely negative feelings either – those who rate his presidency as “fair”?
Voters who share this view are primarily independents and dissatisfied Democrats, and Harris enjoys the support of a majority of them.
While these voters may not be particularly positive about Biden’s presidency, most of them currently support Harris, not Trump.
This analysis is based on a CBS News/YouGov poll conducted with a representative sample of 3,258 registered voters nationwide surveyed between August 14 and August 16, 2024. The sample was weighted by gender, age, race, and education based on the American Community Survey and the U.S. Census report’s Current Population Survey and past election results. Respondents were selected to be representative of registered voters nationwide. The margin of error for registered voters is ±2.1 points.
Battlegrounds are AZ, GA, MI, NC, NV, PA and WI.
