Clinton Holds Large Leads In Nevada And South Carolina

The latest polls have shown us that, at least for now, Clinton holds a lead in the first caucus state of Iowa (February 1st) and Sanders holds a lead in the first primary state of New Hampshire (February 9th). They could well come out of those first states fairly close in the number of delegates won.

But the next two states could propel Clinton into a big lead in delegates, and set her on the road to victory. They are the Nevada caucuses (February 20th) and the South Carolina primary (February 27th). And a new poll shows Clinton has a substantial lead in both of those states.

It is the new CNN / ORC Poll -- done on October 3rd of a random sample of 253 Nevada Democrats (with a margin of error of 6 points) and 301 South Carolina Democrats (with a margin of error of 5.5 points). The results are represented in the charts above.

The new survey shows Clinton with a 15 point lead in Nevada, and a whopping 31 point lead in South Carolina over Sanders (and Sanders is actually in third place in South Carolina, behind Joe Biden). If you take Biden out of the picture (see charts below), the Clinton lead over Sanders grows in both states -- 22 points in Nevada and 50 points in South Carolina.

There's still about 3 and a half months until the primary season starts, but it looks like Sanders still has a lot of work to do outside of New Hampshire to make his candidacy really credible.