A week ago, it seemed like Super Tuesday – and potentially the entire nomination contest – was Bernie’s game to lose and everyone else’s to grasp at. A lot has changed in the last week.
First, Biden won South Carolina by a huge margin. As the state with the most delegates and the last contest prior to Super Tuesday, this gave Biden’s seemingly floundering campaign a shot in the arm. It was easy to predict that Biden would win; nobody predicted that he would win by that much.
Next, other candidates starting dropping like flies. First Tom Steyer. Then Pete Buttigieg. Then Amy Klobuchar. And then Beto O’Rourke joined most of them in endorsing Joe Biden. Meanwhile, Elizabeth Warren stays committed despite having no realistic path to the White House. She’s even poised to lose her home state’s contest today to Bernie.
So, the moderate and centrist wing of the party seems to be aligning behind Biden, clearing that lane for him. On the other hand, the only other candidate near Bernie on the ideological spectrum continues to compete, theoretically splitting that lane.
By contrast, Bernie may have some residual benefits from his previous wins that may have an effect on today’s results. There were many of early voting ballots cast prior to South Carolina and prior to the other candidates dropping out.
Fifteen contests will take place today. Two states to watch are Texas and California, two of the largest and most delegate-heavy states in the union.
We will know who wins California as soon as today, but we won’t know final vote tallies or delegate allocations for about a week; California accepts mail-in ballots that are postmarked on election day.
FiveThirtyEight has a few graphs that illustrate the powerful effects of the South Carolina electorate, essentially flipping the race on its head and giving Biden a better shot at winning a plurality of pledged delegates (at least for now).
Whatever happens today will define the narrative of the rest of the primaries. Whether Bernie or Biden could come out in the lead, it will likely remain a close race. Bloomberg’s performance has yet to even be tested to this point.
Of course, it ain’t over till the votes are in and the TV pundits sing, and all we can do until then is speculate.