2:35pm Friday Warren has dropped out, leaving a two-candidate race between Sanders and Biden. The delegate count at The Green Papers currently gives Biden a 671-599 lead over Sanders, from popular votes of 35.1% Biden, 28.7% Sanders. In California, Sanders has an 8.4% lead over Biden with over 3 million votes remaining, but some of these will be Republican primary votes. Late counting in California skews more left the longer it goes.
2:19pm Thursday Last night, Bloomberg withdrew from the contest and endorsed Biden. No decision has yet been made by Warren. In California, Sanders leads by 8.7% with all election day precincts reporting. We should know approximately how many outstanding votes are left tomorrow.
9:53pm Conversation article up. Biden is likely to win ten states to four for Sanders, and has a 102-delegate lead in The Green Papers count. In 2016, Clinton had little appeal to lower-educated whites, and that’s likely why Sanders was competitive. But Biden has more appeal to the lower-educated than Clinton. Once moderate rivals withdrew, he consolidated the moderate vote.
8:37pm With 79% of election day precincts counted in California, Sanders leads Biden by 31.8% to 22.8%. California takes FOUR weeks to count all its votes, so there’s lots of late counting to look forward to!
7:32pm With almost all votes counted in the Israeli election, the right bloc lost a seat, so Netanyahu will be three seats short of a majority. It’s right 58 out of 120, left 55, Yisrael Beiteinu seven.
7:27pm The California Secretary of State now has 64% of precincts reporting, and Sanders is almost 10% ahead of Biden.
6:00pm Texas CALLED for Biden.
4:15pm Biden up to a 1.8% lead in Texas, and the Needle now gives him a 70% chance to win.
4:06pm Biden overtakes Sanders in Texas. He’s 0.4% ahead with 60% of election day precincts in. The Needle gives Biden a 56% chance to win Texas.
4:05pm The NY Times shows 23% of California’s Election Day precincts have already reported, but the California Secretary of State (the official results service) says only 4%.
3:47pm With 54% of election day votes reporting in Texas, Sanders leads by 1.2%. The Needle still sees this as 50-50 between Sanders and Biden.
3:21pm Dave Wasserman has called Texas for Biden, but the NY Times Needle says it’s 50-50 with 34% reporting. Sanders has a 3.6% lead.
3:18pm Massachusetts officially CALLED for Biden. With 65% reporting, he has 33.4%, Sanders 26.7% and Warren 22.1%.
3:10pm With 93% of election day votes in in North Carolina, Biden’s lead is now almost 19 points, up from seven before election day votes.
3:03pm California not called for Sanders, but it looks good for hime in exit polls. Biden likely the only other candidate who breaks the 15% delegate threshold statewide.
2:47pm Minnesota CALLED for Biden. He leads by eight points with 57% reporting. Sanders was supposed to win here.
2:45pm With 43% reporting in Alabama, Sanders is at 16.2%, close to the 15% delegate threshold. Falling below 15% would be a disaster for Sanders.
2:34pm Sanders has won Utah, a stronghold for Republicans where the small Democratic electorate is progressive.
2:30pm In Texas, Sanders leads Biden by 5.6% with 23% of election day precincts in. The NY Times needle has Biden very slightly ahead.
2:25pm Dave Wasserman projects Elizabeth Warren will finish third in her home state of Massachusetts, behind Biden (first) and Sanders (second).
2:15pm While I was out for lunch, Biden was CALLED the winner in Arkansas, Oklahoma and Tennessee, giving him six state wins. Sanders won Colorado, mainly due a split early vote. Early voting dominates in that state. Biden currently leads in Minnesota and Massachusetts, which Sanders was supposed to win.
1:01pm The NY Times needle gives Biden a 68% chance of winning Texas although Sanders currently leads by 6.6%.
12:58pm As the Election Day vote comes through in North Carolina, Biden increases his lead. He’s now leading in NC by 11% with 29% in.
12:45pm In Virginia, where the election day vote was virtually all voters, Biden leads Sanders by 54-23 with 96% reporting.
12:34pm Maybe early voting will stop Biden from routing Sanders. Biden is only up by seven points over Sanders in North Carolina with 12% of Election Day precincts reporting. Biden not doing so well in votes cast before South Carolina and the withdrawals.
12:18pm With 66% reporting in Virginia, Biden is crushing Sanders by 30 points.
12:15pm Polls in Arkansas close at 12:30pm, then it’s Colorado and Minnesota at 1pm, Utah at 2pm and finally California at 3pm.
12:10pm As regards Texas, a small part of the state is in the Mountain Time zone and doesn’t close til 1pm AEDT. Exit polls will be released then.
12:06pm Alabama CALLED for Biden, while the other 12pm states are uncalled. In Massachusetts, it’s a close three-way race between Biden, Sanders and Warren (it’s Warren’s home state).
11:57am Biden is over 20% in the first Vermont results. If he stays above 15% there, he gets delegates, which Hillary Clinton was unable to do in 2016.
11:49am Biden has a 55-23 lead over Sanders in Virginia with 32% in.
11:40am Count in Virginia is already up to 22%, and it’s Biden by a crushing 54-24 over Sanders with nobody else close to clearing 15%.
11:34am CNN CALLS North Carolina for Biden based on a large exit poll lead. This is looking better and better for Biden.
11:27am With 1% reporting in Virginia, Biden leads Sanders by 51-25. Everyone else is well below the 15% delegate threshold.
11:24am The next polls to close are North Carolina at 11:30am AEDT, then Alabama, Maine, Massachusetts, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Texas at 12pm.
11:08am Sanders CALLED the winner in his home state of Vermont, but the exit polls suggest Biden will beat the 15% threshold there, restricting Sanders’ delegate advantage.
11:01am Biden CALLED the winner in Virginia by CNN based on exit polls. He has a 63-18 lead over Sanders with black voters (27% of the electorate) and a 43-26 lead with whites (63% of electorate).
10:20am Wednesday With 94% counted in the Israeli election, right-wing parties have 59 seats (up four since the September 2019 election) and left-wing parties 54 (down three). Likud is the biggest party with a 36-32 lead over Blue & White, reversing the 33-32 deficit last September. It appears that Netanyahu’s coalition will be two seats short of a majority.
Guest post by Adrian Beaumont, who joins us from time to time to provide commentary on elections internationally. Adrian is an honorary associate at the University of Melbourne. His work on electoral matters for The Conversation can be found here, and his own website is here.
Fourteen states vote in the Super Tuesday Democratic primaries tomorrow, in which 1,357 of the 3,979 total pledged delegates are awarded (34% of all delegates). Delegates are awarded proportionally to vote share, but with a high 15% threshold that applies to both statewide delegates and Congressional District (CD) delegates. The more Democratic-leaning a CD is, the more delegates it receives. Polls close between 11am and 3pm AEDT.
A few days ago, it appeared likely that Bernie Sanders would come out of Super Tuesday with a large delegate lead over his nearest rival. Even if Sanders did not win a majority of Super Tuesday pledged delegates, such an outcome would have put him on course for a large plurality of all pledged delegates at the July Democratic convention. In those circumstances, Sanders would probably be the nominee.
However, Joe Biden had a crushing 28-point win over Sanders at Saturday’s South Carolina primary. In the next two days, moderate rivals Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar withdrew from the contest and endorsed Biden. There has not been enough time for polls to catch up with these developments, but they are very likely to assist Biden.
The FiveThirtyEight forecast has the chance nobody wins a pledged delegate majority surging to 63%. This does not necessarily mean a contested convention, as it includes cases where one candidate wins a strong plurality, and a deal is worked out before the convention. No delegate majority chances have surged because Mike Bloomberg and Elizabeth Warren are still in, and will be assisted in getting to 15% by the withdrawals.
Sanders now has just a 52% chance of winning more delegates than any other candidate, down from over 70% at his peak, while Biden’s chances have rocketed to 48%. The Democratic contest is now effectively a race between two men in their late 70s, and the winner will confront Donald Trump, who is a mere 73.
I recommend The Green Papers for delegate and popular vote counts. The next contests are next Tuesday, when six states vote that account for 9% of pledged delegates.
Netanyahu could win Israeli election outright
With 81% counted in Monday’s Israeli election, right-wing PM Benjamin Netanyahu’s bloc of parties had 60 of the 120 seats, to 53 for the opposition left bloc. If the right bloc wins one more seat, Netanyahu would have outright victory after April and September 2019 elections resulted in no government being formed. Yisrael Beiteinu, with seven seats, was unable to cooperate with either the Arab Joint List or the religious right parties before. This result comes despite Netanyahu’s November indictment on bribery and fraud charges.
Unlike all the Sanders fans on here, I have no problem whatsoever with centrism.
But I do have a significant problem with Biden. Like Hillary, he might be able to win the nomination on the basis that 1) the Dem machine has cleared all the more talented moderate candidates out of the way and 2) his appeal to minorities in deeply red states.
But come election day, neither of those things are going to help him make headway in the swing states. What’s the battle of the slogans going to be? Trump: “We’re making America great again.” Biden: “I’m boring, so I’m safe.”
As someone pointed out on PB the other day, all but one of the Dem candidates who have won the Presidency had at least the appearance of being fresh and different: JFK, Carter, Clinton, Obama. LBJ was the one exception, but he ran as an incumbent (and only won after mounting an hysterical campaign against his rival).
Apart from a meaningless sentimental association with Obama in the minds of some, Biden doesn’t have any of the appeal of the above. He’s old, he’s a WASP, he’s from the north-eastern seaboard, he’s 100% a Washington insider, he’s got nothing new to say about anything much. Not a winner IMO.
Nor is Sanders, but at least he’d be something from out of the mainstream.
The Bro’s see themselves as anti-Establishment. Anyone who questions them – by their lights – is by inverse definition from, of and for the Establishment. This is meaningless idiocy, but it is the calculus they use.
I feel ya, Meher.
#draftOprah
“Big A Adriansays:
Wednesday, March 4, 2020 at 9:38 am
…
Interpretation: I voted Biden for no reason whatsoever.
US centre-left politics right there.”
So what? The “not Trump” side needs those sort of people too.
That voter didn’t vote for Sanders.
As much as America needs someone like Sanders he’s not going to fly for the middle of the road voters. Biden will. Much more.
“Political Nightwatchmansays:
Wednesday, March 4, 2020 at 11:26 am
“Maybe Hewson would have turned out as bad as Howard, but i doubt it.”
Hewson would have been just as bad if not worse then Howard.”
Depends what you think is more important. Hewson would have been even dryer economically, but likely to have been a bit more socially progressive.
RI
says:
Wednesday, March 4, 2020 at 12:27 pm
The Bro’s see themselves as anti-Establishment. Anyone who questions them – by their lights – is by inverse definition from, of and for the Establishment. This is meaningless idiocy, but it is the calculus they use.
________________________
Now is about the time Briefly reminds us he is of the ALP Left faction! 🙂
Now Biden leading in Texas. Massachusetts is also shaping up to be interesting.
Biden’s team sure milked every vote out of Dallas with that rally yesterday, just got him into the lead in Texas
Yep, Mass looks like Warren and Bernie cannibalising each other
meher baba
“But come election day, neither of those things are going to help him make headway in the swing states. What’s the battle of the slogans going to be? Trump: “We’re making America great again.” Biden: “I’m boring, so I’m safe.””
Essentially, yes. If the mood of voters is anti-Trump, then “I’m boring, so I’m safe” might be enough to get Biden over the line. This hypothesis will be tested Nov 2020.
Note that Biden was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania (a swing state).
Bloomberg landslide in American Samoa – 5 delegates to him, 1 to Gabbard
Nothing for Joe or Bernie
Nick Corasaniti
Nick Corasaniti, in Austin, Texas 4m ago
Bloomberg spent $34 million on ads in Alabama, North Carolina and Virginia. Biden spent $650,000 on ads in those states. Biden won all three states.
Early count. Sanders has 12 point lead in Texas.
Biden as winning where expected. Don’t be fooled by media narrative.
It’s a good night for Biden so far but it’s by no means over.
Sprocket
Bloomberg’s millions got American Samoa. 🙂
Ray (UK) @ #100 Wednesday, March 4th, 2020 – 12:22 pm
In the Fake News file. 🙂
Sanders now surging clear in Texas. If he doesn’t blitz California I can’t see him beating Biden on today’s results. Once the no-hopers like Bloomberg and Warren drop out it’ll be Bernie v RotW.
Robert Reich on turnout – Trump is motivating.
Trump should worry. Democrats are on the march.
Virginia turnout exceeded 2016 and 2018.
New Hampshire turnout exceeded 2016 & 2008.
South Carolina turnout exceeded 2016 & was close to 2008.
When Democrats turn out, as we are now — as we did in the midterms — we win.
Kakuru @ #111 Wednesday, March 4th, 2020 – 12:46 pm
Joe Biden will actually do something about bringing back good jobs to the Mid West.
Jeez, meher baba, you really don’t like it when the good guys look like they might win, do you?
Turnout – voters at Texas State Uni in Houston 30 min after polls close.. could the Dems flip Texas?
Cat
I hope Sanders wins. He is more electable.
Only yesterday Biden forgot the god in god we trust quote and called Fox host Chris Wallace Chuck.
There were good reasons for supporting Buttigieg and Klobuchar over Biden.
sprocket_ @ #120 Wednesday, March 4th, 2020 – 1:01 pm
🙂
So was Gene Sesky.
Hopefully Biden doesnt also go bananas.
Colorado called for Sanders based on exit poll.
Biden now odds on (1.50) to win nomination.
Colorado called for Sanders based on exit polls. I’d expect to see some better news for Bernie over the next few hours, as the western states start to announce results. He’s probably a bit unlucky in that the Bide-won states closed first, and his big wins in VA, NC, AL etc have dominated the early coverage, and quite possibly were the main message that most Americans got before going to bed. Still, a very middling night, at best, for Sanders, and the 538 projections suggest that Biden will edge him on delegates over all of the contests tonight.
sprocket_ @ #120 Wednesday, March 4th, 2020 – 1:01 pm
It’ll take 20 years but it will eventually become a tossup state.
The Dems really need to work on texas hard for a generation to get it back.
Hard to make many assumptions before the West Coast comes in, but so far its looking like Biden has massively surged, Bernie is doing well but not as well as expected before SC, and that Bloomberg and Warren will almost certainly have to drop out after tonight. Its way to early to declare a winner between Biden and Sanders, however, but it seems pretty neck and neck overall – going forward, I reckon a lot will depend on where Bloomberg and Warren’s supporters go, which you’d think will work in Biden’s favour.
https://apps.npr.org/liveblogs/20200303-super-tuesday/#projected-to-win-colorado-102
TEXAS ELECTION RESULTS
https://results.texas-election.com/races
Slackboy72 – actually, Texas will turn purple far sooner than that. There is a noted phenomenon that many people are moving from the more expensive states (eg California) and moving to the Sun Belt states, and they are bringing their political leanings with them. This has already turned states that used to be pretty solid Republican like New Mexico and Colorado more reliably Blue, and Arizona is fast heading that way too. Texas, of course, is much bigger than those states, so the process is much slower, but there has been a lot of speculation that many Texas suburban House districts will go Blue over the next few years, possibly as soon as November.
It could be that Trump is speeding up a realignment that is happening anyway, as blue collar white in the mid-West trend Republican, while affluent and educated suburbanites move in the opposite direction. It’s quite possible that by, say the 2028 Presidential election, states like Texas, Georgia, North Carolina, and Arizona will be voting Democratic more often than not (following the path of Virginia, New Mexico and Colorado), while states like Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan are more commonly Republican (again, following the path set by Ohio).
Once Texas stops voting GOP, it will be very hard for their nominees to with the Presidency, and show the Faustian pact the Party has made with Trumpism – it has bought them some short-term gain, but longer-term it’s a loser of a strategy.
Texas only 4% counted and already 112,000 votes for candidates who have dropped out 🙁
Joe Biden wins Tennessee! 64 Delegates in his bag.
Bernie Sanders wins Nashville and Knoxville(University town). Bloomberg at 17%. Sanders may pick up a few delegates in Tennessee.
Just to be very clear.
Trump will attack Sanders on socialism
Trump will attack Biden over corruption senility and lying.
That’s why I view Sanders as more electable.
Tulsi Gabbard will be in next debate for her delegate win in Samoa.
Biden makes Hillary Clinton look like Obama in comparison to Biden as a candidate.
Reports Bloomberg dropping out tomorrow
Looks like Bloomberg taking votes away from Biden in Texas. He’s on 18.7% and Biden on 22.4%. Sanders on 28.8%. Warren not getting enough votes to get any delegates.
Hugoaugogo
” There is a noted phenomenon that many people are moving from the more expensive states (eg California) and moving to the Sun Belt states, and they are bringing their political leanings with them.”
This demographic phenomenon is known as ‘Californication’. Although Nevada, New Mexico, and Colorado have succumbed, and Arizona is tracking in that direction, I believe Texas has a way to go. In Texas, the Dem vote is also helped by the growing number of Hispanic voters. However, there is evidence that this is partly countered by many previously moderate white Texans becoming more conservative in response.
“Reports Bloomberg dropping out tomorrow”
He’s only just dropped in!
To sum up Biden is winning states that will vote republican in November and Sanders is winning where the election will be decided.
Someone close to Cory Booker’s former campaign is suggesting that Biden is reassembling the Obama coalition – Blacks + college whites – as well as keeping a lot of non-college older whites in the tent. Throw in a not insignificant number of ex-GOP suburbanites, and he’s developed a pretty decent coalition of groups.
NYTimes commentary..
Lisa Lerer
Lisa Lerer, in New York Just now
The Sanders team was hoping for a blowout. They are not getting that. This is looking like a protracted fight for the nomination.
Sydney Ember
Sydney Ember, in Essex Junction, Vt. 1m ago
The Sanders fund-raising email, promising better results later in the night, is striking to me. Gone is the swagger we saw from the Sanders campaign after Nevada.
Stephanie Saul
Stephanie Saul, in New York 1m ago
More than 1.3 million Democrats have cast votes in Virginia — nearly double 2016. As Trip Gabriel points out, it’s proof the Blue Wave has taken over Virginia. See Virginia resu
Minnesota called for Biden
Minnesota goes to Biden.
MexicanBeem
Of the states voting today, the only battlegrounds are NC and Minnesota – both won by Biden
Happy to hear an alternate take on Colorado, Texas
MexicanBeemer – er, Biden did win pretty big victories in Virginia and North Carolina, and I think NC in particular qualifies as a swing state. So far Sanders has won a very narrow victory in NH, and bigger wins in Vermont, Nevada & Colorado, all states which will almost certainly vote Democratic in November no matter who the candidate is. All that said, party primaries are not really a good predictor for a general election.
Sprocket
Biden will lose to Trump.
Poor results for US democracy with four more years of Trump.
Biden is not going to magically get better at campaigning.
Bloomberg pulling votes away from Biden in Colorado.
‘Take a hint, Mike!’ Internet reacts to news Bloomberg will ‘reassess’ his campaign
On Tuesday night, following a string of disastrously bad showings in states where he had invested millions in advertising, NBC News reported that former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg will be “reassessing” his presidential campaign, and weighing whether to drop out.
– GOODBYE BLOOMBERG!!!
– Reassessing?? What does he need to reassess? He’s got not path. Time to take a hint, Mike!
– While he’s “reassessing” his campaign or whatever Bloomberg owes everyone apology for his egotistical bullshit campaign.
https://www.rawstory.com/2020/03/take-a-hint-mike-internet-reacts-to-news-bloomberg-will-reassess-his-campaign/
–
Guytuar
Biden doesn’t have to campaign, just show up smile, say some platitudes.
If he says anything – “I’m not Donald Trump” should do.