Poll finds Warren and Biden locked in a tight race for Democratic nomination

Warren and Biden are followed by Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders with 15%, California Sen. Kamala Harris and South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg at 5% each, and businessman Andrew Yang and author Marianne Williamson with 2%. No one else received over 1% in the poll.

Patrick Murray, Monmouth University's polling director, acknowledged that their August poll -- which found Warren, Sanders, and Biden in a three-way tie -- was an outlier compared with other polling conducted around the same time. But the new Monmouth poll confirms other recent polling suggesting a far tighter race for the Democratic nomination.

It, along with a late-September Quinnipiac University poll, is the second recent national poll to show Warren and Biden topping the field and within the margin of error of each other, and the third to show Warren in the mid- to upper-20s in support.

While eight in 10 registered Republicans and Republican-leaning independent voters say Donald Trump ought to be re-elected President in 2020, 15% said someone else should be in office.

Among voters overall, support for Trump drops substantially. Only 39% of registered voters thought Trump should continue to hold office, 57% said someone else, basically unmoved since November 2018, when Monmouth first asked the question.

The poll was conducted September 23 through 29, as House Democrats announced an impeachment inquiry into the President.

Warren is the most warmly viewed Democratic candidate among registered Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents, with 75% who have a positive opinion of the senator, compared to only 9% have an unfavorable opinion. Sanders and Biden are also viewed favorably by around three-quarters of Democratic voters, but their unfavorable ratings were higher (around one-in-five found each unfavorable).

Trump's favorability was the worst among registered voters (compared to the top Democratic candidates), with 43% favorable and 56% unfavorable. But his favorable rating among registered Republicans and Republican-leaning independents was better than any prospective Democratic candidate among their own party. Over eight in 10 (84%) Republican voters have a positive opinion of the president, while 13% have an unfavorable opinion.

The Monmouth University Poll was conducted by telephone from September 23 to 29, 2019 with 1,161 adults in the United States. The results in this release are based on 1,017 registered voters and have a +/- 3.1 percentage point sampling margin of error. This release also includes results based on 434 voters who identify as Democrats or lean toward the Democratic Party which have a margin of error of +/- 4.7 percentage points.