Elizabeth Warren is on the rise — the presidential hopeful’s aggressive policy push is translating into a surge in the polls just in time for the first set of debates.

A series of recent surveys show the Massachusetts senator is making gains after weeks of polling in the low single-digits. Warren’s now holding steady in the teens — and in some cases edging U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders for the No. 2 slot behind front-runner Joe Biden.

“She’s run an extremely good ground game,” said Democratic strategist Scott Ferson. “I couldn’t put Joe Biden into a sound bite. … But I can put Elizabeth Warren in a sound bite: ‘I have a plan for that.’”

An Economist/YouGov poll this week put Warren at 16% support to Sanders’ 12% — and just 10 percentage points behind former Vice President Biden at 26%. The first Monmouth University Poll of likely Nevada caucus voters put Warren ahead of Sanders with 19% and 13%, respectively. And a new U.C. Berkeley/LA Times poll has Warren edging Sanders by a percentage point.

Warren remained third behind Sanders in this week’s Quinnipiac University poll, with 15% support to his 19%. But it’s an upswing from the 4% she polled in Quinnipiac’s March 28 survey.

David Paleologos, director of the Suffolk University Political Research Center, said there’s a direct correlation between Warren’s surge and Sanders’ decline, because as members of the party’s progressive wing, “they share the same political base.”

John Cluverius, political science professor at the University of Massachusetts Lowell, said Sanders “seems to be coasting on the popularity of his 2016 run and not quite understanding that his support is actually quite soft” — creating an opportunity for Warren to poach from Sanders’ base.

Warren’s policy-pushing has voters associating her with “competence and trustworthiness,” Cluverius said, which “allows her to set herself apart from the field and also capture votes of people who want kind of an insurgent voice in the party, who are not super rosy on Joe Biden but also might be very concerned about whether or not someone as far to the left as Sanders could win.”

Warren’s rise is good news ahead of the first Democratic National Committee presidential debates, which will be held June 26 and 27 in Miami and broadcast on NBC. Warren was among 14 candidates to pass both of the DNC’s qualification thresholds: getting at least 1% support in three qualifying polls, or reaching 65,000 individual donors — including 200 apiece in 20 states.

Twenty candidates qualified in all — the lineup, 10 candidates per night, is expected to be announced Friday — while U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton, Mayor Wayne Messam of Miramar, Fla.; Gov. Steve Bullock of Montana; and former Alaska U.S. Sen. Mike Gravel did not.

Appearing at the Edward M. Kennedy Institute Thursday, Moulton said he knew he wouldn’t make the cut. But he said the election wouldn’t be decided by one debate.

“I’m not concerned, but I’m also not naive,” Moulton said. “Look, it’s a big field and we poll very well among people who know me. But most Americans just don’t know me yet because I’m new to the race.”