BYRON YORK: Joe Biden is no longer a front-runner.

Back in May of this year, Biden had an enormous 26.8 percentage point lead over the second-place Democrat, Sen. Bernie Sanders, in the RealClearPolitics average of national polls. By late June, that lead had shrunk to 15.6 points. By Sept. 1, it was 13.5 points. By mid-September, it was 9.7 points.

Now, Biden’s lead is 2.2 points, which is essentially no lead at all. He is just ahead of Sen. Elizabeth Warren, with Sanders having fallen farther back and the rest of the field in the mid-to-low single digits.

Certainly Biden has not been helped by Trump, locked in an impeachment battle with House Democrats, characterizing Biden and son Hunter Biden as corrupt. “Look, Biden and his son are stone-cold crooked,” the president said at the White House Wednesday. Even if the public knows virtually nothing about the Bidens’ case, it’s not good to be called corrupt 24/7.

That could account for a decline in Biden’s support in the last week or so. But Biden’s numbers have been trending downward for months.

I don’t think Democrat primary voters care if he’s crooked; they care if he looks like a loser.