Super Tuesday: Joe Biden surges on big day after sweeping upper Midwest and African American bastions in South
Former vice president Joe Biden has made a remarkable comeback to the 2020 presidential race. After winning the South Carolina Primary comprehensively on February 29, the veteran bagged Minnesota, Arkansas, Virginia, North Carolina, Alabama, Tennessee and Oklahoma.
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Frontrunner Bernie Sanders could only win his home state of Vermont till the latest reports came out while billionaire candidate Michael Bloomberg clinched American Samoa.
Sanders was expected to win Virginia, a blue state, as early polls showed him taking a decent lead over Biden who also had just one rally in the Presidents' state. But yet in the final count, the socialist candidate could not register a win in the state that he had also lost in the 2016 primary to former secretary of state Hillary Clinton by nearly 30 percent. Even in North Carolina, Sanders was leading in early polls before the primary but could not stop the former Delaware senator from winning it. Sanders had lost NC too to Hillary by a margin of 14 percent.
Biden's win made possible by coalition of black voters
Biden's victory was made possible by a coalition of black voters, voters aged over 65 and those who want to see the back of President Donald Trump this November. Early exit polls showed almost two-thirds of black Democratic voters in Virginia back Biden. Seven in 10 Democratic voters above 65 went for the former vice president who has recently been endorsed by former candidates such as Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar and Beto O'Rourke. Sanders could get the vote of one in five black Democratic voters.
Biden was also predicted to leading in some others like Massachusetts and Maine and the trend showed that his victory in South Carolina was no fluke and instead laid the foundation of a phenomenal comeback. After the initial disappointments in Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada, Biden started winning the more diverse states and they earned him more endorsements, especially from the party’s moderate wing.
It is still early days on the first Super Tuesday as results of the big two — California and Texas — are yet to come out. But as of now, Biden is making the most of his momentum.