Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden holds a narrow lead over Sen. Bernard Sanders of Vermont in the race for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, according to national polling released on Monday.

Mr. Biden was the top choice of 24% of Democratic voters and Democratic-leaning independents, followed by Mr. Sanders at 22%, Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts at 17% and Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Indiana, at 13%, according to the NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll.

Tech entrepreneur Andrew Yang was next at 5%, and former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota and Sen. Cory A. Booker of New Jersey were at 4% apiece.

No other candidate topped 1%.

The survey was released as Mr. Biden, Mr. Sanders, Ms. Warren, Mr. Buttigieg, Mr. Yang, Ms. Klobuchar and former hedge fund manager Tom Steyer prepare to debate later this week in Los Angeles.

However, the candidates have also indicated that they won’t cross a picket line amid a labor dispute affecting employees at Loyola Marymount University, the scheduled site of the debate, injecting some uncertainty into the proceedings.

The survey of 704 Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents was taken from Dec. 9-11 and has a margin of error of plus or minus 5.4 percentage points.

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