Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden. | Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden has maintained a nearly double-digit national lead over President Donald Trump among registered voters since last month, according to a new survey — with the major-party nominating conventions and damaging reports of Trump’s remarks about the military apparently leaving little imprint on the White House race.
A Monmouth University poll released Thursday reports that more than half of registered voters nationwide — 51 percent — prefer Biden, while 42 percent favor Trump. Biden’s 9-point edge comes after he notched a similar 10-point advantage over Trump, 51-41 percent, in the previous pre-convention version of the poll, conducted in early August.
The latest Monmouth survey also shows Biden with a high-single-digit lead of 7 points among likely voters, 51 percent of whom back the former vice president and 44 percent of whom support the Republican incumbent.
The poll was conducted in the days immediately following reports by The Atlantic and other media outlets of the president disparaging U.S. service members and America’s war dead. Trump allegedly said a burial ground for fallen Marines was “filled with losers,” believed captured soldiers missing in action “had performed poorly and … deserved what they got,” and opposed the inclusion of wounded veterans such as amputees at a military parade.
The president and a cast of current and former administration officials have denied he made such remarks, while Biden called the reports “absolutely damnable,” saying: “I’ve just never been as disappointed in my whole career with a leader that I’ve worked with, president or otherwise.”
Of the registered voters surveyed by Monmouth, 71 percent said Biden respects our military troops and veterans a great deal (48 percent) or some (23 percent). Just over half of registered voters — 55 percent — said Trump respects our military troops and veterans a great deal (41 percent) or some (14 percent).
The Monmouth University poll was conducted Sept. 3-8, surveying 758 registered voters with a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.6 percentage points.
