SUPER TUESDAY
COUNTDOWN
How the Democrats line up — locally and nationally COVER STORY BY JACKSON BAKER
Fe b r u a r y 2 7 - M a r c h 4 , 2 0 2 0
SUPER TUESDAY FUN FACTS
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• Voting for a Democratic presidential candidate is scheduled in 14 states and two territories on March 3rd. (President Donald J. Trump is unopposed on most state ballots.) • The total number of Democratic delegates to be won on Tuesday is 1,588. To win the nomination at the Democratic national convention in July in Milwaukee, 1,991 delegates on first ballot, or 2,376 after that will be needed. • Tennessee’s share is 73 delegates, which, like those from other states, will for the Democratic convention be assigned proportionately to candidates’ vote outcomes. • There are 16 choices for the Democratic presidential primary — 15 candidates, most of whom are now inactive, and one choice for “uncommitted” delegates. • There are choices for local offices as well on both a Republican and a Democratic ballot. (See “Politics” at memphisflyer.com for coverage of these.) Voters must choose which ballot they prefer.
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his commentary is written on the cusp of the South Carolina primary and will likely be read in the immediate wake of that important test — first in the South — of Democratic presidential candidates. Next week — March 3rd — comes Super Tuesday voting. As of this writing, four candidates were dominating local and national attention. The Killer Bs, call ’em: Bernie Sanders, Joe Biden, Mike Bloomberg, Pete Buttigieg. Still actively contending were Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar. And, though her major accomplishment thus far was to have been accused of being a “Russian asset” by Hillary Clinton, Tulsi Gabbard was still in the race, as well as Tom Steyer. All of the aforementioned have had their moments. Biden, the somewhat folksy figure who served in the U.S. Senate for 36 years and eight years as Barack Obama’s vice president, entered the race in April 2019 as the presumed Democratic frontrunner and maintained that position, more or less, though with declining poll ratings, all the way up to the first competitive test, that of the Iowa caucuses earlier this month. A fifth-place showing there, followed by a fourth-place finish in the New Hampshire primary, a week later, took the ex-Veep to the edge of elimination, but his presumed strength among African-American voters gave him real hopes of a Carolina turnaround. Biden has the distinction, if that is
the right word, of having been the object of GOP President Donald J. Trump’s efforts to besmirch his name, and that of his son Hunter, in relation to the latter’s involvement as a highly paid board member of a dubiously provenanced energy company in Ukraine. It is hard to estimate the effect, for better or for ill, of all that on Joe Biden’s political fortunes, especially in light of the candidate’s disinclination to comment on the subject. That reluctance is one of the many factors that make it difficult to assess the residual chi of the 77-year-old Biden, who in the judgment of many observers has measurably slowed down from his peak. He remains a respected figure, however, particularly among post-45-year-olds, and, as mentioned, a beloved one among African Americans, with whom he consistently polled higher than nowdeparted black candidates Cory Booker and Kamala Harris. In Memphis, Biden, a bona fide moderate on such matters as national health-care policy, has been backed by such figures as Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris and influential state Senator Raumesh Akbari, and no doubt can reckon with similar kinds of establishment Democratic support elsewhere on the Super Tuesday spectrum. He will need it to continue competing with the now-surging Bernie Sanders and the big-spending newcomer Mike Bloomberg. Harris, for one, is undeterred by
Biden’s slow start in earlier states. Said the county mayor: “I believe Joe Biden is that candidate that can appeal to us — we’re all the audience — from sea to shining sea, all across America. Joe Biden is the candidate that can take a message and convert people to supporters. And he has the experience that matters. … So he’s been put on the back foot a little bit here right now. But his personal story will, if you take a moment to look at it, reveal to you that he has been able to overcome tremendous personal and professional adversity.” Akbari also was emphatic, noting that “when it comes to the general [election], unfortunately, we in Tennessee are a deep shade of red, but we can help select the nominee who’s going to take us across the finish line in November and kick the surface and get the swamp — the real swamp — out of the White House.”
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o what to make of the unprecedented financial largesse and sudden prominence in Democratic presidential ranks of former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg? Until his declaration of candidacy in late November, his political affiliation remained obscure, inasmuch as he had passed through a lengthy stage of his life as a Republican, though a liberal one of the sort today’s GOP is unused to. Bloomberg’s presence among his fellow Democratic contenders is seemingly as unwelcome to them as it is welcome to the party’s somewhat
