LiveUpdated
Tuesday 3 March 2020 16:14
Super Tuesday is finally upon us, with voting taking place in 14 states across America on who should be the Democratic contender to take on Donald Trump in November’s presidential election.
The Democratic field has finally thinned out, with Amy Klobuchar, Pete Buttigieg and Tom Steyer dropping out this week, leaving front-runners Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden to duke it out and Elizabeth Warren and Michael Bloomberg fighting for survival.
Biden received a slew of last minute endorsements on Monday from Klobuchar, Buttigieg, Beto O’Rourke and former Senate majority leader Harry Reed as the party’s moderate wing comes together to try to block a Sanders landslide in key states like California and Texas.
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Bernie Sanders’ surrogates are attacking Joe BIden after the Democratic establishment appears to have coalesced behind the former vice president in his bid for the White House.
Nomi Konst, a national surrogate for the Vermont senator and 2020 hopeful, called Mr Biden a “mercenary for Donald Trump” in an interview on Tuesday.
She told RCP: “Maybe we should be asking why the Dem Party is allowing this to happen, and if their intention is really to win.”
Danielle Zoeneller has this from election soothsayer Nouriel Roubini, known as “Dr Doom” for his pessimistic predictions, which is just an awesome nickname whichever way you slice it.
Amy Klobuchar says Biden has a ‘decency that’s exactly what we need right now’
The Minnesota senator has been on NBC’s Today show this morning t explain her decision to back out of the race and endorse Joe Biden.
She has also been bonding with Rachel Dratch, the comedian who impersonated her on Saturday Night Live.
Conrad Duncan has this report on an American hero reaching out a pair of trembling chopsticks for a slice of prawn toast that could be his last.
Here’s Elizabeth Warren going to vote in Cambridge, Massachusetts, this morning, where she was met by crowds of supporters in a state she is expected to win.
Bernie Sanders has rejected accusations he is unable to turn his policies into action, responding to claims he “fails” to get things done by listing his political achievements for two minutes.
During a CNN interview on Monday, presenter Anderson Cooper challenged the veteran Vermont senator to respond to criticism from Elizabeth Warren.
Sanders is “a senator who has good ideas but whose 30-year track record shows he consistently calls for things he fails to get done and consistently opposes things he nevertheless fails to stop,” Warren said last week during a campaign event in Houston.
Chris Baynes has more on his impassioned response.
A deadly tornado has ripped through Nashville leaving at least seven dead and many more injured, according to local authorities.
The natural disaster is expected to have an impact on voting in a state where Joe Biden had been tipped to win handsomely.
Zoe Tidman has a full report on the tragedy as Alabama also braces itself for storm damage.
Here’s a useful graphic to illustrate the current state of play, drawing on several key polls.
The president is back on Twitter singling out his favourite target on Super Tuesday, meddling in the race by warning citizens of Texas and Oklahoma he plans to take away their natural resources jobs and deriding his “incompetent” debate perfomances.
Here’s Graig Graziosi with an overview of what’s at stake in each of the 14 states in play today, from Alabama to Virginia.
Here’s Louis Staples for Indy100 on the important role expatraites will play in today’s proceedings.
The man who predicted the past nine elections says that the United States may well be staring down its first brokered convention in nearly 70 years.
It’s a prospect that has stirred considerable consternation among Democratic Party officials and voters, many of whom have said their primary concern is beating Donald Trump in November – even as an enthusiastic debate over the future of democratic politics has raged on the campaign trail.
“I think the most likely outcomes are Sanders wins or nobody wins, and for the first time in over 50 years we actually have a convention nominating the candidate,” Allan Lichtman, a political science professor at American University who has predicted elections dating back to 1984, told The Independent.
For Indy Voices, southerner Larisa Thomason says her experience of switching her allegiance five times and donating to six different candidates over the course of the primary season is far from atypical and means that anything could happen today.
Also for Voices, Andrew Buncombe says the secret to understanding the former Obama veep’s appeal is seeing him live. Like The Fall.
This is great from Lucy Gray on why, for many Americans scarred by personal tragedy, healthcare reform is the only issue that matters this year and there’s only man whose vision is radical enough to realise real change.
Clark Mindock has been to Burlington, Vermont, to see what the locals have to say about their senator’s appeal to the nation at large.
“He’s a good tipper, he’s always in a hurry, he’s always busy,” says bartender David Beams.
The man who almost robbed Ted Cruz of the Texas Senate in 2018 and who has since become a passionate anti-firearms activist is being accused of hypocrisy over his Diamond Joe endorsement.
Rory Sullivan is here to explain.
For Indy Premium, Chris Stevenson says the billionnaire former New York City mayor is today’s biggest mystery factor.
Those latest numbers not looking good for the candidate.
Here’s the latest polling on today’s race, which sees Bernie and Joe splitting the two most crucial states between them.
According to those Data Progress numbers below, things are looking good for the old veep: North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, Alabama, Arkansas and Oklahoma are all set to fall to him too.
Another interesting survey here on how the coronavirus might impact Tuesday’s turnout.
Here’s Clark Mindock to answer perhaps the day’s biggest question: where are disappointed Buttigieg voters going to turn to?
Will they simple follow their man’s prescriptoin and back Diamond Joe or will a more complicated picture emerge?
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