Polls 2020: Biden stretches national lead to 14 points with just six days left to go, Independent poll reveals

A three-point increase for the Democratic presidential nominee in just a few weeks

Former Vice President Joe Biden has opened a 14-point national lead over Donald Trump with just six days remaining before the final ballots will be cast, according to a new poll by The Independent.

That is a three-point increase for the Democratic presidential nominee in just a few weeks when compared with another version of the same survey conducted by JL Partners.

Fifty-five per cent of 844 likely voters surveyed 26-28 October said they intend to vote for Mr Biden. Forty-one per cent selected the president.

Mr Biden continues to out-perform Hillary Clinton, the 2016 Democratic nominee, with white voters. He now has the support of 15 per cent more likely voters among this group than the former secretary of state secured in the election four years ago.

The former vice president is doing 5 percentage points worse among Black voters than Ms Clinton did, but still has the support of 80 per cent of this group, JL Partners and The Independent found in the new survey – that is an 8-point increase from the 13 October version of the poll.

The new survey comes as an average of several polls compiled by RealClearPolitics gives Mr Biden a 7 percentage point lead.

While the JL Partners findings show a widening for the former VP, the RealClear average suggests a narrowing in a race multiple Democratic and Republican political strategists this week called too-close-to call. That’s because Mr Trump is within striking distance in almost every battleground state.

That includes Arizona, where RealClear shows the president trailing by 2.4 percentage points as he holds a pair of Tuesday rallies trying to keep the southwestern state in his column.

As he attempts to do so, he says 2020 polls are “like 2016” and is pressing federal courts to halt any counting of ballots in any state after 3 November (Election Day).

“Hopefully, the states that want to take a lot of time after November 3rd, that won’t be allowed by the courts,” the president said at an unplanned event with business sector representatives in Las Vegas.

While Mr Trump is banking on an assist from the courts, James Johnson, a former 10 Downing Street pollster and co-founder of JL Partners, sees Mr Biden as in command – but with a caveat.

“Joe Biden has extended his lead in the last week of the campaign,” Mr Johnson said. “Though the real fight is in the battleground states, this puts him in a very strong position going into Election Day itself.”