New Poll Shows Pete Buttigieg and Joe Biden Tied With Donald Trump in Traditionally Republican Arizona

Two Democratic 2020 candidates, South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg and former Vice President Joe Biden, are both in a dead heat with President Donald Trump in the traditionally Republican state of Arizona, a new poll shows.

The latest hypothetical general election matchup poll for December 2019 released on Monday shows Biden with 44 percent of support among overall voters compared to Trump's 45 percent, while Buttigieg is at 43 percent to Trump's 45 percent in a head-to-head matchup. Both are within the Phoenix, Arizona-based OH Predictive Insights poll's 3.9-point margin of error and also reveals that support for Buttigieg has increased significantly over the past several months.

Buttigieg's rise in Arizona could signal increased support among more moderate or conservative voters in the state, which has voted for the Republican Party nominee for president in every election since 1952, with the exception of Democrat Bill Clinton's slim victory there in 1996.

Trump won Arizona's 11 electoral votes in the 2016 presidential election, defeating Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton by about 4 percentage points, or about 92,000 votes.

Support for Biden has inched down in Arizona since August surveys conducted by the same group showed him just barely ahead of Trump at 45 percent. But the same poll conducted in Arizona in May saw Biden leading Trump by 5 percentage points, taking in just about 50 percent of support. The May OHPI poll of 600 respondents likely to vote in the November 2020 general election saw every Democrat other than Biden losing to Trump in a mock-up general election.

But Buttigieg has gathered about a 6-percentage point increase in support from that same August poll in which double-digit figures of general election voter respondents admitted they were "undecided" who they would support between Buttigieg and Trump.

The other two frontrunner candidates who are frequently seen neck-and-neck with Biden in Democratic polls, Senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, both fared worse than Biden and Buttigieg in Arizona, according to the poll conducted between December 3-4.

Warren gathered 41 percent of support versus Trump's 47 percent and Sanders was much further behind with just 34 percent to Trump's 47 percent. Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has 40 percent. Both Warren and Sanders, however, performed about the same in the August poll.

As opposed to the shifting Democrats, Trump's support in Arizona has remained fairly steady in the middle-40s throughout the course of 2019. And pollsters have expressed their doubts about a Democrat nominee squaring off against Trump next November. The Arizona Democratic primary is set to be held on March 17.

"No Democrat has earned more than 47 percent in a presidential election here since LBJ in 1964, but given this president's apparent ceiling, that might just be enough to win when November rolls around," Jacob Joss, an OH Predictive Insights data analyst, wrote in a press release.

Attendees at a Scottsdale, Arizona Democratic debate watch in June described Buttigieg and California Senator Kamala Harris as the "stars" of the two-part primary debate held that week, The Arizona Republic reported. Several viewers lavished praise over the two younger Democratic contenders for being eloquent speakers and "clear leaders," but Harris has since dropped out of the 2020 race.

Democrats may be gaining traction in the state after the 2018 midterm elections, which saw Kyrsten Sinema defeat Republican Martha McSally in the U.S. Senate election. Democrats flipped the state's 2nd District House election, but the GOP maintains the governor's office.