Subject: Washington Post (The Fix) - Polls say Joe Biden’s age isn’t necessarily hurting him with young Democrats
From: "Bill Russo" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>, "Finnegan James" <[email-masked]>, "JRB ware" <[email-masked]>, "Jill Biden" <[email-masked]>, "Maisy Biden" <[email-masked]>, "Naomi Biden" <[email-masked]>, "Valerie Owens" <[email-masked]>, <[email-masked]>, <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 05 Dec 2018 16:23:15 -0500

All -

Per the VP’s request, sharing this piece from the Washington Post, with the
content pasted below:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2018/12/05/polls-say-joe-bidens-age-isnt-necessarily-hurting-him-with-young-democrats/

Regards,
Bill

—

Democratic voters have split along generational lines in the past two
presidential primary cycles. And the very early front-runner for 2020,
former vice president Joe Biden has been criticized for being, well, old.

In the limited polling we have, Biden, 76, leads the pack of potential 2020
Democratic nominees, a substantial portion of whom are older than 65. On
Monday, the Wall Street Journal released a survey
<https://www.wsj.com/articles/iowa-democrats-say-they-want-generational-change-1543833001>
of
Iowa Democratic Party chairs that found many were hesitant to support an
older candidate in 2020. The biggest worry among that group was that older
candidates would not garner enthusiasm from younger voters.

“I can’t see how my generation, 18- to 34-year-olds, can get excited about
a 70-year-old candidate ever again,” Bryce Smith, 26, the Dallas County
chairman, told the Journal.

Beyond party officials, does early polling show that Biden has a problem
with younger Democratic voters?

In 2008 primaries and caucuses where exit polls were conducted, Democratic
voters younger than 30 supported eventual nominee Barack Obama by a
20-point margin (58 percent to 38 percent), while voters 65 and older
favored Hillary Clinton by a similarly wide 24 points (58 percent to 34
percent). The generation gap grew to a chasm in 2016, with Sen. Bernie
Sanders (Vt.) winning Democrats younger than 30 by a whopping 43-point
margin, while Clinton won seniors by 42 points. Younger voters did not get
their way that year.

Early 2020 polls cast doubt on the idea that Biden is destined to fare
poorly among younger Democrats. A Washington Post-Schar School poll
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2018/politics/midterm-battleground-districts/>
of
battleground congressional-district voters in the 2018 midterms found that
younger and older Democrats were about equally supportive of Biden as the
party’s 2020 nominee. Among voters who supported Democratic House
candidates, 35 percent of those ages 18 to 34 said they would like Biden to
win the party’s 2020 presidential nomination, identical to his 35 percent
support among Democrats age 65 and older.

As in 2016, Sanders in this poll received far more support from younger
Democrats than seniors (31 percent vs. 5 percent), although he did not
quite match Biden’s level of support, even among the youngest cohort of
voters. Sanders’s strength with younger adults appears to have come more at
the expense of potential candidates Michael R. Bloomberg and Sen. Cory
Booker (D-N.J.) than from Biden.

An earlier CNN poll
<https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/5002040-2020.html> in October
found Biden weaker among younger Democratic and leaning-Democratic
independents when asked whom they support for the 2020 nomination. Biden
garnered 33 percent support among Democratic-leaning adults overall, but
his support was 13 points higher among those ages 45 and older (39 percent)
than among Democrats younger than 45. Nonetheless, that age gap is smaller
than it was for Clinton in 2016, and Biden’s level of support among voters
under 45 is at least slightly higher than Sanders at 21 percent, Sen.
Kamala D. Harris (Calif.) at 13 percent, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (Mass.) at
11 percent and others in the single digits.

A separate CNN poll in
<https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4426174-2020.html>March found
large majorities of younger and older Democrats at least open to supporting
Biden for the party’s nomination in 2020. Among Democratic-leaning adults,
81 percent of those younger than 45 said they would be very or somewhat
likely to support Biden if he runs for the Democratic nomination, similar
to 86 percent of those 45 and older. Both figures were similar to or higher
than those for other potential candidates tested, including Sanders.

None of the polls above guarantee that Biden will fare well among younger
Democrats in caucuses and primaries, which are
<https://www.wsj.com/articles/iowa-democrats-say-they-want-generational-change-1543833001>
more
than one year away. The past two cycles suggest younger and older Democrats
are attracted to different types of candidates, making it one of the key
factors to watch in 2020, along with racial and ideological divisions
within the party.

Biden’s potential candidacy could also falter if he doesn’t generate
excitement among Democratic Party officials and activists such as those
highlighted by the Wall Street Journal, which could sap his campaign of
donations and volunteers. But the consistency of support for Biden across
age groups shows that the extremely early front-runner has appeal across
generations.
-- 

---
Bill Russo
Spokesperson
Office of Vice President Joe Bide