Bernie Sanders has over­tak­en Hillary Clin­ton as Iowa’s top choice for the Demo­c­ra­t­ic cau­cus, accord­ing to a Quin­nip­i­ac Uni­ver­si­ty poll. Sanders edged ahead of Clin­ton 41 per­cent to 40 per­cent in the sur­vey of more than 800 like­ly Iowa par­tic­i­pants in the Demo­c­ra­t­ic cau­cus four months from now. This comes on the heels of Sanders’ surge in New Hamp­shire, where he polled 41 per­cent and Clin­ton 32 percent.

Sanders’ rise has made him the one to watch in an excit­ing Demo­c­ra­t­ic race. He is run­ning ​“against his own par­ty’s boss­es and the prized pres­i­den­tial can­di­date,” not­ed Peter A. Brown, the assis­tant direc­tor of the Quin­nip­i­ac Uni­ver­si­ty Poll. ​“Sanders has seized the momen­tum by offer­ing a mes­sage more in line with dis­pro­por­tion­ate­ly lib­er­al pri­ma­ry and cau­cus voters.”

Sanders’ show­ing in this Sep­tem­ber poll saw an 8 per­cent jump from when the poll was last con­duct­ed in July, the same time Sanders spoke to a 2,500-strong crowd, his biggest in Iowa yet. In com­par­i­son, sup­port for Clin­ton has dropped 12 per­cent since July.

Sanders was ​“stunned” by the poll results, he told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer Thurs­day after­noon. ​“We have a mes­sage I believed from day one was going to res­onate with the Amer­i­can peo­ple,” he said, list­ing issues such as Amer­i­ca’s dimin­ish­ing mid­dle class, income inequal­i­ty and cli­mate change. ​“I thought those issues would res­onate. Did I think they would res­onate as quick­ly as they have? The answer is no.”

Sanders also per­formed strong­ly in the remain­der of the sur­vey, which assessed vot­ers’ opin­ions of the Demo­c­ra­t­ic can­di­dates and the can­di­dates’ per­ceived trust­wor­thi­ness and lead­er­ship qual­i­ties. Sanders topped the poll as the can­di­date most believed to ​“care about the needs and prob­lems of the peo­ple like you” at 85 per­cent, com­pared to Clin­ton at 78 per­cent and Biden — who has not announced if he will run — at 84 percent.

Eighty-six per­cent of those polled con­sid­ered Sanders ​“hon­est and trust­wor­thy,” com­pared to 64 per­cent for Clin­ton, a poor show­ing like­ly due to the con­tro­ver­sy sur­round­ing her use of a pri­vate email serv­er when she was in pub­lic office.