Ryan Lizza: “There are six states voting on Super Tuesday with electorates that roughly resemble that of South Carolina (Alabama, Arkansas, North Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia). Sanders lost all of them in 2016. Biden has to be the clear favorite in all except Texas, where Sanders has been polling well and has improved his standing among Latino voters compared to 2016.”
“Sanders lost California and Massachusetts in 2016, but before Saturday at least, he was the leader in both states. If there are any polls in the next three days, changes in those three places — Texas, California and Massachusetts — will be a bellwether of how consequential the South Carolina landslide is for Biden.”
“The other states to vote Tuesday — Vermont, Oklahoma, Colorado, Maine, Minnesota, and Utah — are likely Sanders strongholds. The Biden comeback seems to set up a very close fight for delegates between the two men, with Bloomberg’s role as a wild card.”
Joe Biden’s presidential campaign announced it raised more than $5 million overnight after winning the South Carolina primary.
Bernie Sanders is on the air with television ads in 12 of the 14 states holding Super Tuesday primaries this week, Reuters reports.
“The Sanders campaign announced it is also buying television advertising time in Idaho, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri and Washington, which hold nominating contests on March 10. It will also buy ads in Arizona, Florida, Illinois and Ohio, which hold contests on March 17.”
“Sen. Bernie Sanders raised $46.5 million in February, his presidential campaign said Sunday, a huge sum that could help sustain him in a lengthy battle for the nomination,” the Washington Post reports.
Aaron Blake: “It wasn’t just the big win; it was also a couple other coinciding dynamics in this race. The first is that Buttigieg and Klobuchar were spectators for the second straight state, with both of those states having been the only really diverse ones in the contest thus far. That’s not a great omen for what lies ahead on Super Tuesday, or for their electability arguments.”
“The other is that the other potential Sanders alternative in this race — former New York mayor Mike Bloomberg — is increasingly struggling with poor debate performances and a problematic paper trail. We still have to see what his hundreds of millions in spending might draw on Super Tuesday, but the sheen is off, to some degree. And now that Biden has won a state, you have to wonder if that might help him steal some Bloomberg-curious voters who migrated to the former New York mayor when Biden was struggling.”
The FiveThirtyEight forecast shows there’s now a 60% chance of a contested Democratic convention.
Bernie Sanders has a 28% chance to win the majority of the delegates, while Joe Biden has an 11% chance. The model gives no other candidate more than a one percent chance.
A new Suffolk University/Boston Globe/WBZ poll in Massachusetts finds Bernie Sanders leading the Democratic primary with 24%, followed by Elizabeth Warren at 22%, Mike Bloomberg at 13%, Pete Buttigieg at 12%, Joe Biden at 11%, Amy Klobuchar at 5% and Steyer at 2%.
An earlier UMass Amherst poll found very similar results.
“Mike Bloomberg’s campaign on Saturday will begin a massive voter outreach push, with plans to hold more than 2,400 events across 30 states ahead of Super Tuesday,” ABC News reports.
“The mobilization drive, beginning as the rest of the Democratic field remained focused on the South Carolina primary, is a show of force meant to highlight the scale of Bloomberg’s nationwide operation.”
“The Bloomberg campaign’s internal data suggests if he dropped out now, it actually would improve Sanders’ delegate path, one adviser told Axios. The explanation goes that Bloomberg draws votes away from Sanders as well as Biden, and that in places where Biden polls too low to be eligible for delegates, Bloomberg only hurts Sanders.”
A new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll in North Carolina finds Bernie Sanders leading the Democratic field with 26%, followed by Joe Biden at 24%, Mike Bloomberg at 15%, Elizabeth Warren at 11%, Pete Buttigieg at 7% and Amy Klobuchar at 5%.
A new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll in Texas finds Bernie Sanders leading the Democratic field with 34%, followed by Joe Biden at 19%, Mike Bloomberg at 15%, Elizabeth Warren at 10%, Pete Buttigieg at 8% and Amy Klobuchar at 3%.
I would view all polling before last night as out of date, because Biden should get a bounce from his win and the collapse of the Bloomberg campaign.
Playbook: “The Biden campaign has been leaning very hard on members of Congress who represent districts that will vote March 10 and March 17 to endorse him, according to multiple people the campaign spoke to. The idea is to create a ripple effect across the country of endorsements in these key districts.”
Popular vote totals for the first four primaries: Biden 29.4%, Sanders 23.6%, Buttigieg 15.3%, Warren 10.0%, Klobuchar 9.6%.
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