Story highlights
A survey of Democrats and independents found low levels of enthusiasm for another Clinton attempt
Other familiar Democratic faces did not excite majorities either
President-elect Donald Trump has yet to take office, but pollsters have already begun to dip their toes into the next presidential cycle.
A USA Today/Suffolk University poll released Wednesday found Democratic and independent voters lukewarm on a handful of party leaders and most excited for “someone entirely new.”
Just over 22% of respondents said Hillary Clinton, the Democratic Party’s failed candidate in the 2016 election, would excite them, while almost 15% said her running in 2020 would “make no difference” and about 62% said she should not run.
Vice President Joe Biden and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders both fared about twice as well as Clinton, but still failed to elicit excitement from a majority of respondents.
After publicly toying with the idea of running in 2020, Biden said he had no intention to do so. If he were to run and win, the current vice president would be 78 years old at the time of taking office. Sanders would be 79, and Trump would be 74.
Meanwhile, about a third of respondents said they would be excited by a 2020 bid from Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, and former Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick was overwhelmingly unknown.
The survey also asked registered voters of all political stripes about more immediate matters. A slight majority said Trump needed to do more to prevent conflicts between his business interests and the nation’s well-being, and almost 62% said the incoming government should investigate Russian meddling in the presidential election.
Six weeks out from the election and just two days after the Electoral College certified Trump’s victory despite losing the popular vote, the poll found a deep split on overhauling the electoral process. Just under 50% of respondents said the system should stay in place, with almost 42% saying the Constitution should be amended to use the popular vote instead and just over 8% responding undecided.
The poll of 1,000 voters was taken December 14-18 and has a margin of error ±3% points. Six hundred and twenty-six of those voters were self-identified Democrats and independents, whose response totals have a margin of error ±3.9% points.