CV NEWS FEED // A rematch between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump seems all but inevitable following near-clean sweeps for both men on Super Tuesday.
As of 11:30 pm ET on Tuesday, Trump is poised to have won all but two of the night’s 15 Republican nomination contests by a margin of at least 20 points each over former Ambassador Nikki Haley.
His biggest margin came in Alabama, where he bested native Southerner Haley by over 70 points. Trump also won by over 50 points in the states of Arkansas, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Texas.
It was not just red-state Republican voters who opted to stick with Trump. The former president also prevailed by wide margins in the primary contests of Massachusetts, Minnesota, and Virginia.
In addition, Trump easily won primaries in two states where officials unsuccessfully tried to kick him off the ballot. In Colorado, Trump beat Haley by 30 points, and in Maine, he is projected to come out ahead by over 50% of the vote.
Haley did manage to score one victory on Super Tuesday, narrowly edging out Trump by four points in the Vermont primary.
The ambassador’s razor-thin win in the reliably liberal state is only her second during this entire primary season. Her first victory came a couple of days ago in the even bluer District of Columbia.
The only other state where Trump looks like he will not win by a 20% margin or more is Utah – a state where he has historically underperformed. He is still projected to best Haley there by a double-digit margin.
Posting on X (formerly Twitter) from a Mar-a-Lago event with Trump, former Rep. Lee Zeldin, R-NY, wrote: “It’s time for Nikki Haley to end her campaign, the Republican Party to unite, and our great country to be saved in November!”
Zeldin is not alone in that sentiment.
In an op-ed published at The Hill, conservative political commentator Derek Hunter wrote: “There is no gray area and there are no silver linings. Trump’s victories were universally expected.”
“Now the question is how long it will take for Haley to accept reality and drop out,” Hunter added:
Haley had a dream of being president. Now it’s time to wake up from that dream. It is not going to happen in 2024. Tuesday’s results aren’t really the deal-breaker, because she never had momentum or a shot. No poll showed her anywhere close to having majority support among Republicans, ever. But they should serve as her last chance at a graceful exit.
According to a CNN poll, 85% – an overwhelming majority – of voters who picked Haley in the North Carolina Republican primary approved of Biden’s performance as president. Only 9% of North Carolina primary voters who backed Trump felt the same.
Recent polls show that Biden has a nationwide approval rating in the 30s.
During a FOX News appearance earlier on Tuesday, Trump correctly predicted his dominant performance.
“My focus is really at this point, it’s on Biden,” Trump said. “We should win almost every state today, I think every state.”
Hours before the results came in, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported that Haley “has no events scheduled for Tuesday or beyond.”
“Her campaign also has no future TV or radio ads booked, according to AdImpact, although it is still spending on digital ads and text messaging to turn out the vote Tuesday,” WSJ added.
Meanwhile, Biden on Tuesday won all state contests on the Democratic side by at least 50%. His narrowest margin came in Minnesota, where he still seems to have scored just over 70% of the vote.
In Minnesota’s Democratic primary, nearly 20% of voters cast “uncommitted ballots,” a total even higher than the 13% of “uncommitted” voters in Michigan’s Democratic primary last week.
The New York Times reported that in Minnesota, “[p]recincts with a higher share of young people were more likely to vote ‘uncommitted’” as “part of a protest of Biden’s Gaza policy.”
Rep. Dean Phillips, D-MN, came in at third place in his home state with 8% of the vote – less than half of the “uncommitted” total.
Like Trump, Biden also came up short in one contest Tuesday night. The incumbent president lost the Democratic caucuses in the territory of American Samoa to a man named Jason Palmer, whom the Times described as “a relatively unknown technology entrepreneur from Maryland.”
Palmer was the only Democratic candidate to campaign in the Pacific territory. Like in other U.S. territories, American Samoa residents vote in presidential primaries but not general elections.
In addition to the night’s presidential results, Super Tuesday also seemed to decide an important U.S. Senate vacancy in California.
Following the Golden State’s crowded senatorial primary, Rep. Adam Schiff, D-CA, and retired Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres legend Steve Garvey, a Republican, advanced to the November general election.
Due to California’s status as a Democratic stronghold, Schiff is now all but assured of heading to the Senate. The longtime congressman is perhaps best known for his role in both of the then-Democratic-controlled House’s impeachments of Trump.
Unlike most states, California uses a “top two primary,” meaning that the two candidates with the most votes advance to the general election regardless of party affiliation.
With Schiff and Garvey placing as the first- and second-highest vote-getters, a pair of far-left congresswomen – Reps. Katie Porter and Barbara Lee, both D-CA – were eliminated from the Senate race.
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