Contrary to popular belief born of political exhaustion, the twenty-car pileup known as the Democratic primary debates may actually have accomplished their intended purpose: helping voters to make decisions about the candidates at hand. A handful of new polls conducted after July’s back-to-back debate nights suggest that public opinion largely aligns with the conventional wisdom about who performed well and who fell flat. It also suggests that likely primary voters are largely forming their early impressions of 2020 hopefuls based on their debate performances. For instance, Elizabeth Warren, who was largely seen as the winner of July’s matchup, saw a slight boost, with her support jumping six points to 21% in a Quinnipiac poll, and two points to 15% according to Politico/Morning Consult.

This more or less corresponds with voters’ assessment of her debate performance. Politico/Morning Consult found that 44% of Democratic primary voters said Warren did an “excellent” job, and Quinnipiac found that 28% of Democrats who watched the debates said she did “the best job.” Support for Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden largely held steady, with Sanders, whose performance 32% of Democratic primary voters deemed “excellent,” hovering around 15%, and Biden, who was seen as “excellent” by 27% of respondents, maintaining a comfortable lead. (Quinnipiac found similar opinions among Democrats who watched the debates; 15% thought Biden had done “the best job,” and 8% said the same of Sanders.)

Meanwhile, Warren’s gains seem to have come at the expense of, Kamala Harris, who experienced a brief polling bump after she attacked Biden for his opposition to busing in the first debate, but who saw her support drop to 7% in Quinnipiac after the second debate.

That’s not to say the debates are total game changers. The absence of a definitive Warren surge, despite the fact that she’s widely seen to have outperformed the others, likely has to do with voters’ expressed concern for electability. A full 49% of voters polled by Quinnipiac said Biden has the best chance of beating Donald Trump. And 50% of respondents said nominating a candidate who’s electable is more important than nominating one who “shares your views on issues.” Both responses could help explain why Biden is still at the front of the pack, even with Warren outperforming him onstage.

Still, the fact that voters seem to have gathered information about non-Biden candidates through their debate performances could be bad news for the pile of egotistical chaff at the bottom. At the moment, candidates will only qualify for the next debate in September if they reach 2% in four polls, as well as 130,000 individual donors, by August 28. So far, only Harris, Biden, Warren, Sanders, Amy Klobuchar, Cory Booker, Pete Buttigieg, and Beto O’Rourke have hit that mark, though Andrew Yang and Julián Castro, are close to meeting the polling threshold. Other candidates have had plenty of time to make their case, but remain in the 1 percenters club and are unlikely to break into 2%, much less hit the necessary number of donors. A new memo from the DNC could give them some breathing room, allowing them to take the next two months to hit the necessary thresholds instead of one. But if polling is any guide, they’re all but destined to remain stuck at the bottom.

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