No longer Biden his time: Joe Biden delivers Super Tuesday sweep
Joe Biden emerged from the shadows to win the votes of nine states in the race to become the Democrats’ US presidential candidate on Super Tuesday.
The former vice-president’s campaign was in the doldrums just last week, but he posted victories in Minnesota, North Carolina, Tennessee, Alabama, Virginia, Arkansas and Oklahoma last night.
Wins in Texas and Massachusetts represented major upsets for rival Bernie Sanders, who had emerged ahead of Biden in recent polling.
Biden found support among black voters in Southern states helped mitigate Sanders’ popularity among Hispanic voters in Texas.
“Just a few days ago the press and the pundits had declared the campaign dead,” Biden announced in Los Angeles. “I’m here to report, we are very much alive.
“For those who have been knocked down, counted out, left behind, this is your campaign. Make no mistake about it, this campaign will send Donald Trump packing.”
However, Sanders is on track to win California and its 415 delegates, along with three other states. Political analysts say Maine is currently too close to call between the rivals.
Both men are frontrunners in the race to clinch the Democratic nomination to take on Republican President Donald Trump in the 2020 US election.
Sanders also posted wins in his home state of Vermont, as well as Utah and Colorado.
The left-wing firebrand, who failed to beat Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination in 2016, took aim at Trump and Biden in a speech last night.
“We’re taking on the political establishment,” he said. “You cannot beat Trump with the same-old, same-old kind of politics”.
“We’re going to win the Democratic nomination and we are going to defeat the most dangerous president in the history of this country,” he added.
Meanwhile, Michael Bloomberg, who bankrolled his run with half a billion dollars, failed to win a single state.
And Joe Biden managed to defeat Elizabeth Warren in her home state of Massachusetts.
Super Tuesday offered candidates a total of 1,344 delegates’ votes ahead of the Democratic Convention in July. To win the party’s nomination, a candidate needs at least 1,991 votes.
