With more than 20 Democratic presidential candidates to choose from, New York City voters have a great deal of research to do ahead of the 2020 primary.
While there is still plenty of time to form opinions on candidates’ policies and proposals, New Yorkers are already hitting the Google search bar for information on the presidential hopefuls.
One might assume that Mayor Bill de Blasio would be among the candidates most-searched in the five boroughs, but according to data provided by Google, New Yorkers are more interested in former Vice President Joe Biden, Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).
In the first six months of 2019, Biden was the most-searched candidate in Manhattan, Queens and Staten Island. Harris was the top search in the Bronx and Sanders reigned in his hometown borough of Brooklyn.
Crown Heights resident Erika Rosato, 25, said she supported Sanders’ presidential bid in 2016 and she’s leaning toward a repeat in 2020.
"I’m very interested in his radical presence. I feel like his views are still true from the get-go," Rosato said, though she also expressed interest in Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.). "It’s kind of hard to distinguish between the two, but I definitely lean more toward Sanders . . . my preference would be him as president, and Warren in the Senate."
With more than eight months to go until New York’s primary, Rosato added that it was "too early" to say whether Sanders will snag the Democratic nomination.
Wrickford Dalgetty, of Prospect Lefferts Gardens, said he was more interested in Biden than Brooklyn’s homegrown Democratic socialist.
"I think Biden has a wealth of experience, unlike many candidates," Dalgetty, 60, said. "I think he will be able to bring a moderate, middle-of-the road political perspective to our nation."
Biden also appealed to West Village resident Robert Landy, 74, though he also had reservations about the former vice president.
"What bothers me about Biden is he’s an old guy," he said, adding that Warren is his front-runner — for now. One of Biden’s top related search queries for the New York metro area is "Joe Biden age," according to Google Trends data. He is 76 years old.
Landy was also surprised that Biden was the most-searched candidate in his borough.
"My guess is, people think he’s more likely to beat [President Donald Trump]," he said. "I don’t fault anyone for choosing Biden … Trump’s gotta go."
Over in the Bronx, Harris taking the top search spot for the borough did not surprise 63-year-old Vallery Shands.
"She’s a smart, black woman. She has an edge to her . . . I’d love to see her in a debate with Trump,” said Shands, who lives in the Concourse neighborhood of the Bronx.
Shands said she is considering a few candidates, including Harris and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D- Minn.).
“I’ve also been looking at Kamala, but I didn’t like what she did to Biden in the [first] debate,” referring to Harris’ attack on Biden’s stance regarding mandatory busing to integrate schools in the 1970s. “She used it as a fundraiser instantly … she had T-shirts with a picture of her on it. I thought it was a little calculated and malicious.”
Biden and Sanders faired pretty well after the second debate in July, according to a Quinnipiac University Poll released Tuesday.
Biden retained his stance as the front-runner with 32% of respondents saying they would vote for him in the Democratic primary, while 14% said they would go with Sanders — up from 11% in the university’s last national survey released in July.
Harris received 7% of voter support, which is down from 12% in the July poll. Warren, dubbed the “big winner” of the second debate by Quinnipiac University, had 21% support — a surge of 6% compared to the July survey.
