Sen. Kamala Harris’ supporters were thrilled by a poll out this week showing she’s in a virtual dead heat with former Vice President Joe Biden in California, but the Quinnipiac University survey also contained a more troubling message for Harris.

Many California Democrats surveyed thought Biden “had the best chance” of defeating President Trump. They also thought he would be “the best leader.”

The not-so-subtle message in the poll brought up one of the most overused terms in politics: “electability.” It’s a word that Harris’ advocates say is loaded with racial and gender stereotypes.

“This (poll) shows that too many people are believing the fiction of electability,” said Aimee Allison, an Oakland activist and founder of She the People, which focuses on issues affecting women of color. “That because Joe Biden is a white guy, he will be able to stand up to another white guy like Donald Trump.”

Ideas about which Democrat is electable have to do “with Donald Trump and the campaign he ran in 2016” against Hillary Clinton, said Jennifer Lawless, a University of Virginia political science professor who has studied the concept of gender bias in politics.

Some voters think the message of 2016 was “that to beat Donald Trump, you need someone who looks like Donald Trump and talks like Donald Trump — and is a straight shooter that Middle America feels comfortable with,” Lawless said.

But given studies that show that women and people of color win elections just as often as white men, Lawless said, “I don’t know if there’s any evidence that is true.”