Grant Rodgers

The Des Moines Register

Sen. Bernie Sanders has risen over Hillary Clinton to become the top choice of Iowa's Democrats, signaling a race that will be neck-and-neck through caucus night, according to a new Quinnipiac University poll.

Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist U.S. senator whose tough talk on Wall Street has made him a liberal icon, got 49% support from likely Democratic caucusgoers, while Clinton won support from 44%. That's a reshuffling in the race from the university's last poll in mid-December that showed the former first lady and secretary of State with 51% and the senator from Vermont with 40%.

Campaign trail rhetoric from both Clinton and Sanders has reflected this tightening in the race.

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The Clinton campaign put Sanders on the defense in recent days by criticizing his 2005 vote shielding gun manufacturers from some civil liability in gun deaths. Clinton's campaign suggested that the senator's stance a decade ago would be in opposition to a slate of gun control measures proposed by the Obama administration earlier in January.

But Sanders told reporters in Iowa on Monday that Clinton knows her campaign is in "serious trouble."

"I think a candidate who was originally thought to be the anointed candidate, to be the inevitable candidate, is now locked in a difficult race here in Iowa and in New Hampshire," Sanders said after a Pleasantville campaign stop.

But while the poll favored Sanders in the first-in-the-nation voting state, likely Iowa caucusgoers saw Clinton as more likely to win the general election in November, results showed. Eighty-five percent of Democrats polled said Clinton would have a "good chance" of winning the presidency over a Republican candidate, while only 68% said the same about Sanders.

Meanwhile, former Maryland governor Martin O'Malley's support dropped from 6% in December to 4%.

O'Malley has consistently struggled to gain traction, but thin margins separating his rivals suggest that O'Malley supporters could become crucial in turning the stakes for either Clinton or Sanders in precincts where he does not win the 15% support needed to be considered "viable" on caucus night, assistant poll director Peter A. Brown said in a release.

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The economy and health care were the top two issues among Iowans polled. Fifty-one percent said Sanders could better handle economic issues, while Clinton narrowly led on health care with 48% preferring her position on that issue. The poll also shows Sanders winning Iowans over on his ability to fight climate change.

“Iowa likely Democratic Caucus-goers see Sanders as better able to handle the economy and climate change, two important issues for Democrats and a key asset for him in the home stretch,” Brown added.

Clinton, however, led the field on foreign policy and terrorism issues; 70% said they saw her more capable in the foreign policy realm and 63% favored her on terrorism.

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