President Joe Biden was swiftly declared the winner of the Democratic primary here in Massachusetts not long after polls started closing in the other states voting on Super Tuesday.
Virginia was declared for former President Donlad Trump and Biden by the Associated Press not long after polls closed at 7 p.m. and North Carolina was called for both men as polls closed at 7:30 p.m.
Results out of Alabama, Oklahoma and Tennessee came shortly after 8 p.m. Iowa, which held its Republican caucus earlier this year, was called for Biden before 8 p.m. Biden also won Vermont, and Maine quickly, with Republican results still up in the air as of press time here in the Bay State.
Their projected wins all but guarantee that the 2024 presidential election will mirror the 2020 election, with only the occupant of the White House changed.
Both campaigns went into the day understandably certain the were about to walk away the winners.
“This Super Tuesday, the split screen between our campaign and Donald Trump’s operation (if you can call it that!) couldn’t be more stark: President Biden continues to see record-breaking grassroots enthusiasm around a historic and winning agenda, while Donald Trump is poised to enter the general election broke,” Biden-Harris 2024 Deputy Campaign Manager Rob Flaherty said in a statement before the polls closed.
“MAGA,” Trump said via his Truth Social media platform before the polls closed. “AMERICA FIRST!”
“THANK YOU, VIRGINIA — MAGA,” he said after that race was called.
“THANK YOU, NORTH CAROLINA — MAGA,” he wrote not long after. That all-caps theme continued through the evening.
Though their victories aren’t enough to propel either man forward in the delegate count such that they can claim to have clinched the nomination on Tuesday, the numbers don’t lie and they spell disaster for former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley’s campaign or that of any other outsider hoping to unseat either incumbent party leader.
Early results out of Virginia, for example, showed author Marianne Williamson beating U.S. Rep. Dean Phillips with less than 6% of the vote and despite the former previously suspending her campaign (she later reversed after a third place showing in Michigan).
In order for Trump to win the Republican nomination, he needs to secure 1,215 delegates out of 2,429. With 865 delegates available on Tuesday, and after Trump won all the proceeding contests excepting Washington D.C., it’s likely his pre-Super Tuesday count of 276 will jump to about 1,100 by the time the dust settles on Wednesday.
In order for Biden to lock up the Democratic nomination, he’ll need 1,968 delegates out of 3,934. Even if he won 1,420 delegates available on Tuesday on top of the 206 he won before then, he’d still be over 300 delegates shy of wrapping up the race. An effort to send Biden a message over U.S. involvement in the war between Israel and Hamas resulted in two delegates being awarded to “uncommitted” after the Michigan primary last month.
Both candidates will likely know mathematically that they are the nominee, if they ever had any doubts, by March 19, when Arizona, Florida, Illinois, Kansas, and Ohio will hold their elections.
This is a developing story and it will be updated.