Poll: Biden support sinks, Harris moves up to third place after Democratic debate

Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) surged into third place among 2020 Democratic presidential candidates following what many considered a standout debate performance on Thursday, according to a new Morning Consult poll. 

The survey, which was released Saturday, found that 12 percent of potential Democratic primary voters chose Harris, who made headlines for confronting former Vice President Joe Biden (D) about his past views on busing, as their first choice for president. The figure represents a 6 percentage point surge from an identical poll released last week. 

{mosads}Harris still trails Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Biden by solid margins. But Morning Consult noted that Harris’s surge came at the expense of Biden, who saw his support drop by 5 percentage points from last week. 

Thirty-three percent of respondents picked Biden as their top choice. Meanwhile, 19 percent of respondents said Sanders was their preferred candidate. 

Twelve percent of possible Democratic primary voters said they’d choose Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) as the party’s presidential nominee. It was a decrease of 1 percentage point and good enough to place her in a tie for third with Harris. 

South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg (D) appeared ahead of Harris in the previous Morning Consult poll, with 7 percent of respondents saying they’d vote for him. He received 6 percent of the support to sit in fourth place in the most recent survey. 

Harris’s rise comes on the heels of a commanding performance on the second night of the first 2020 presidential debates. At one point, the California senator engaged in a contentious back-and-forth with Biden after she criticized his opposition to busing to desegregate schools.