Elizabeth Warren passes Beto O'Rourke for 2nd place behind Joe Biden in Texas polls

U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts has moved into second place with Texas Democratic voters, behind former Vice President Joe Biden but ahead of Beto O'Rourke, the former congressman from El Paso, according to two polls released Wednesday, just ahead of Thursday's third Democratic debate at Texas Southern University in Houston.

Two Texans — O'Rourke and former San Antonio Mayor Julián Castro, who is lagging in the surveys — will be among the 10 candidates onstage for Thursday night's three-hour debate, the first in which all the candidates who met the Democratic National Committee's polling and fundraising thresholds will be appearing on the same stage the same night.

While Biden continues to hold a comfortable lead in Texas in both the Quinnipiac University Poll and University of Texas/Texas Tribune polls, as he does in virtually every national survey, the two new Texas polls both offer good news for Warren, who held a rally Tuesday night before 5,000 people on the shores of Lady Bird Lake in Austin. According to the UT/Texas Tribune poll, Warren is also the second choice of more voters than any other candidate, an important measure in a big field that will almost certainly winnow before the state's March 3 primary. Also, according to Quinnipiac, voters prefer Warren's policy ideas to those of all the other candidates.

The two polls also indicate that while O'Rourke is very well-liked among Texas voters, and he is performing much better in his home state than he is at this moment nationally. He is, in the words of Jim Henson, director of the Texas Politics Project, which conducts the UT/Texas Tribune poll, "stuck in the mud" in Texas, and thereby losing ground as Warren rises.

The two polls offered very similar overall results.

Quinnipiac found Biden with 28% support from Democratic voters in Texas and independent voters who lean Democratic, followed by Warren with 18%, and O'Rourke and U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont each at 12%. In Quinnipiac's Texas survey in early June, Biden had 30%, O'Rourke had 16%, Sanders had 15% and Warren had 11%.

Four other candidates were all in low to middle single digits in the Quinnipiac poll: U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris of California at 5%, Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Ind., and Castro at 3%, and U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota at 2%. No other candidate was polling at more than 1%.

In the UT/Texas Tribune poll, Biden was backed by 26% of Democratic voters, followed by Warren at 18%, O’Rourke at 14% and Sanders at 12%. In the June 2019 UT/Texas Tribune poll, it was Biden at 23%, O’Rourke at 15%, Warren at 14% and Sanders at 12%.

According to the UT/Texas Tribune poll, Texas Democrats continue to hold O'Rourke, the party's 2018 U.S. Senate candidate, whose strong performance invigorated the party and helped elect down-ballot Democrats, in high regard, with 78% of Texas Democrats saying they have a “very” or “somewhat” favorable opinion of him, while 11% hold an unfavorable opinion and 8% were either neutral or held no opinion.

Castro, who served as secretary of housing and urban development in the Obama administration, is liked but far less well-known than O'Rourke. He is rated positively by 62% of voters and negatively by 7%, with 31% holding a neutral or no opinion.

The UT/Texas Tribune poll is an internet survey of 550 registered voters who indicated their intention to vote in the 2020 Texas Democratic presidential primary. It was conducted Aug. 29 to Sept. 8 and has an overall margin of error of 4.17 percentage points.

The Quinnipiac poll was conducted Sept. 4-9. It surveyed 1,410 self-identified registered voters in Texas with a margin of error of 3.1 percentage points, but with a margin of error of 5.5 percentage points for the sample of Democratic voters and independent voters who lean Democratic.

The UT/Texas Tribune poll found that the top four candidates were also top second-choice picks for voters. Warren was the second choice at 24%; O’Rourke and Sanders, were at 13% each, Biden was at 11%, Harris at 8% and Castro, Buttigieg and entrepreneur Andrew Yang, at 4% each.

In Castro’s case, 23% of his supporters said they are “very likely” to change their choice before the primaries. The comparable figure for O’Rourke was 16%.

Quinnipiac found that among Democratic and Democratic leaning voters, 32% rated Biden the best leader, followed by Warren at 20% and Sanders at 12%.

Half of respondents said Biden had the best chance of beating President Donald Trump, followed by Sanders and Warren at 10% each.

But 31% said Warren had the best policy ideas, followed by 15% who named Biden and 13% who named Sanders.

The UT/Texas Tribune poll also found the contest for the Democratic nomination to challenge U.S. Sen. John Cornyn of Texas in 2020 is still largely a muddle.

MJ Hegar, a decorated Air Force veteran from Round Rock, who ran a close race with U.S. Rep. John Carter, R-Round Rock, in 2018, leads the large field of candidates, but with only 11% support. Two thirds of respondents said they don't know who they will support yet.