Joe Biden will join a growing pack of fellow Democrats when he announces his run for the presidency Thursday — and will immediately find himself competing for campaign cash and media time against at least 20 rivals.
President Obama’s former two-term vice president, who’ll turn 78 days after the 2020 election, was expected to announce his candidacy in an online video and follow that up on Monday with an appearance in Pittsburgh at a union hall.
Biden starts with an instant lead in the polls, despite recent claims that his touchy-feely behavior around women over the decades has made many people cringe.
A Reuters/Ipsos poll out Wednesday shows the former Delaware senator ahead of all the other Democrats while enjoying strong support from minorities and older adults — key voting blocks for any Democratic presidential contender.
Thirty-two percent of adults 55 and older said they would vote for Biden over the other candidates. And 30% of nonwhite adults, including about four in 10 African Americans, said they would back the former veep.
A Monmouth poll a day earlier showed Biden outpacing his nearest rival, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, by 27 to 20%.
None of the others in the massive field — including Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Kamala Harris of California, and South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg — scored in double digits in that survey.
And a Politico/Morning Consult poll released Wednesday found Biden beating President Trump 42 to 34% in a hypothetical matchup.
Analysts say Biden still faces serious obstacles because of his late entry into the race and his history of lackluster campaigning.
“He has lost commitments from some big donors who he needs, given [his] weakness with small donations. His big challenges: a very bad record campaigning, a Senate record that won’t sit well with many Democrats, an aversion to fundraising, and the fact he is facing a big and exciting field of candidates,” Julian Zelizer, a professor of history and public affairs at Princeton, told The Post.
Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, said Biden has better name recognition than the rest of the field but cautioned that it was too early to predict winners. He also noted that Biden’s past presidential runs were dismal.
“Biden starts off as a modest favorite but no more than that. His past efforts at the [presidency] have been a flop. He doesn’t raise much small-dollar money. His age is a problem, though Trump and Sanders are in the same ballpark,” Sabato said in an email to The Post.
Lee Miringoff, director of polling at Marist College, said Biden has to do more than run on his résumé.
“Just having served as VP doesn’t define his vision for the future that will be vital for all the candidates, especially those who are well known for things in the past,” he said.
But Matt Hale, a political science professor at Seton Hall, said being the veep to a well-liked president could help.
“He might win like George H.W. Bush because he was the VP to a very popular president,” Hale said referring to Ronald Reagan.
Biden also had a history of supporting the NRA while in the Senate, although he spearheaded Obama’s efforts to toughen gun laws.
And he’s a gaffe machine on the campaign trail — exhorting a Missouri politician who used a wheelchair to stand up and greet the crowd in September 2018.
While Sanders may remain his biggest threat for now, one or more rivals in the party’s diverse group of candidates could gain traction over the long haul.
Harris, a former prosecutor who has staked out tough positions on regulating Wall Street and on criminal justice reform, is not taking cash from corporate PACs.
Warren has already gained a reputation as a harsh critic of the banking industry following the 2008 financial collapse, while Buttigieg is riding a political wave to near the front ranks of the Democratic pack.