Joe Biden is the only Democrat leading President Donald Trump in Ohio, according to a Quinnipiac poll out Thursday morning. Biden tops Trump 50%-42%, while every other Democrat polled is effectively tied with the president.
Ohio is a key swing state on the 2020 electoral map. Former President Barack Obama narrowly won here in 2012, then Trump eased through in 2016, part of his near-sweep of Midwest swing states that propelled him to the White House.
In the state’s March 17 Democratic primary, former Vice President Biden leads the field again. There he’s at 31% to 14% each for Senators Kamala Harris and Bernie Sanders, with Elizabeth Warren at 13%.
The poll has very bad news for native son Tim Ryan, a U.S. representative from northeast Ohio who’s stressed his blue-collar credentials and ability to play in the Midwest. He’s polling just 1% in his own state.
Biden, Booker Appear at Urban League Convention
The 2020 Democratic field continues its quest to lock down black voter support Thursday and Friday as candidates move from the NAACP convention to the National Urban League gathering in Indianapolis.
Joe Biden and Cory Booker are among those speaking Thursday at the Urban League convention, potentially putting them on a collision course for another round over their records on criminal justice before next week’s Democratic debate in Detroit.
The two men have been sparring this week after Biden on Tuesday released proposals that would roll back measures in the 1994 crime bill – which he authored as the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee – that contributed to longer prison sentences for black convicts.
Booker complained Tuesday that “the proud architect of a failed system is not the right person to fix it.” Biden swung back Wednesday, telling reporters that while Booker was mayor of Newark, New Jersey’s largest city, “his police department was stopping and frisking people, mostly African American men.”
Biden’s campaign followed that with a pre-emptive strike on Booker’s potential debate attacks, offering up some “hard questions” about Booker’s record. “Next week’s debate should focus on how we can fix the system – not on Booker’s specious charges about Biden,” deputy campaign manager Kate Bedingfield said in a statement.
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