WASHINGTON – About one-third of the delegates required to secure the Democratic presidential nomination are up for grabs in the electoral windfall known as Great Tuesday.
To put things into perspective, there were 155 promised delegates available in the first four contests of the race, which were the obsession of candidates, voters, experts and political tipsters for the month of February. On Super Tuesday, 1,344 delegates are to be taken – as well as 13 delegates representing Americans abroad, who have one week to vote from Tuesday.
If a candidate can obtain 1,991 or more candidates out of the 3,979 candidates available in all primary competitions before the National Democratic Convention on July 13, the nomination is theirs.
These numbers help explain why billionaire media mogul Mike Bloomberg decided to ignore Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina to focus his half-billion-dollar ad blitz on the states of the 3rd of March.
Sanders leads is at the top of the delegate count after the first four contests, but Biden closed within eight with his decisive victory in South Carolina on Saturday. Will Sanders put the nomination out of reach after Tuesday’s vote, or will Biden have enough momentum outside of Palmetto State to keep the race competitive? What effect will Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar and Tom Steyer lose on the race? How will Bloomberg’s unorthodox approach pay off?
Alabama
Delegates to win: 52
What to watch: Alabama race polls have been rare, so it’s unclear how the main race is preparing. The latest survey, which was conducted in July, found that Biden had a lead of almost 20 percentage points. The race has changed dramatically in the past seven months.
Biden will be helped by his approval of the Alabama Democratic Conference – an influential African-American political league. One of the biggest questions will be how many voters in the state are attracted to Bloomberg after its advertising bombing.
On the Republican side, former Attorney General Jeff Sessions is fighting to regain his Senate seat in a battle with former college football coach Tommy Tuberville, representative Bradley Byrne and former judge Roy Moore. If none of them obtains a majority, there will be a second round between the two best finalists on March 31. Whoever encloses the nomination will face outgoing Democratic Senator Doug Jones, who will face a fierce battle for re-election to the deeply red state.
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Arkansas
Delegates to win: 31
What to watch: One of the few race polls shows Bloomberg one point ahead of Biden. The Talk Business & Politics / Hendrix College poll was conducted from February 6 to 7, before the poor performance of the New York mayor’s debate in Las Vegas and Charleston, South Carolina.
Last month, Little Rock’s mayor Frank Scott, the first African-American mayor elected by the capital, approved Bloomberg as president.
Advance polling is underway in the state and has continued until Monday.
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California
Delegates to win: 415
What to watch: Although it was the mother mother of the delegates, the candidates in the previous primaries did not always give California the love that its millions of democratic voters considered it deserving, because it did not vote until the beginning of June, when the races were generally already decided.
The State Democrats therefore increased their primary to Super Tuesday, which makes the state critical for the chances of the candidates.
A Suffolk / USA University poll TODAY published on Sunday found that Sanders had the support of 35% of likely primary democratic voters, ahead of Bloomberg at 16%, Biden at 14% and Warren at 12%.
The voter turnout among Latino voters – who make up a third of state eligible voters and only 15% of them register as Republicans – is likely to be high. This is probably more good news for Sanders, who won more than half of the Latino caucuses in neighboring Nevada on February 22, according to entrance polls.
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Colorado
Delegates to win: 67
What to watch: Some facts highlight the Colorado primary: it organizes elections by mail; it is one of the only Super Tuesday states with more unaffiliated voters than registered Republicans or Democrats; and it will be his first primary since abandoning the caucus format after the 2016 elections.
Sanders, who won the state in 2016, looks set to win it again. Two polls published last week found him with a double-digit lead.
“I think you can predict that Bernie Sanders will likely do well,” said Floyd Ciruli, Denver-based pollster and analyst. “If he wins here, it will show that this state remains a state with many voters who like to make things happen.”
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Maine
Delegates to win: 24
What to watch: Like Colorado, Maine has abandoned the caucus system and, for the first time in two decades, will hold a primary instead.
There have not been many polls on the Democratic race in the state, where Sanders defeated Hillary Clinton in 2016 by almost 30 percentage points. One of the few, a Colby College poll from February 10-13, found Sanders at 25%, followed by Bloomberg at 14% and Biden at 12%.
The same poll found Sara Gideon, the president of the Maine House of Representatives, leading the Democratic primary to challenge GOP sitting senator Susan Collins in the fall.
Collins, seeking a fifth term, faces the toughest race in his Senate Senate career in moderately blue state after voting with President Donald Trump on controversial issues such as impeachment, judge confirmation Supreme Court Brett Kavanaugh and the tax cuts in 2017.
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Massachusetts
Delegates to win: 91
What to watch: Warren is fighting to win his homeland, according to a survey by the University of Suffolk for the Boston Globe and WBZ-TV which found it with the support of 22% of likely Democratic primary voters, dragging Sanders to 24 %.
They were followed by Bloomberg (13%), Biden (11%) and Gabbard (4%).
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Minnesota
Delegates to win:75
What to watch: Sanders won the state in 2016 with 62% of the vote. This year, he has the approval of the representative Ilhan Omar and the liberal group TakeAction Minnesota.
The departure of Minnesota senator Klobuchar could pave the way for Sanders to leave with state delegates, unless Klobuchar persuades the majority of his supporters to vote for Biden, whom she has approved.
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North Carolina
Delegates to win: 110
What to watch: Trump – who crushes his only primary opponent, former Massachusetts governor Bill Weld – will hold a rally in Charlotte the day before primary.
Republican Senator Thom Tillis will be on the ballot in November and Democratic primary voters will determine who will hire him on Tuesday.
The main contenders for Tillis are ex-state lawmaker Cal Cunningham, an Iraq war veteran who ran unsuccessfully in the United States Senate 10 years ago, and Senator Erica Smith. Cunningham has the support of the national party on Smith, who is more liberal.
In the Democratic Presidential race, polls show a close race with Sanders, Biden and Bloomberg at the top.
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Oklahoma
Delegates to win: 37
What to watch: Sanders wrote a law that would ban hydraulic fracturing, better known as hydraulic fracturing, which brought in a lot of income to Oklahoma but was blamed for the earthquakes and water pollution. Oklahoma native Warren supports such a ban, as does Gabbard.
Bloomberg had a narrow lead in one poll last month, and Biden had a small lead in the other. The two found Sanders close behind in second place.
Primary silver: Sanders holds head of Democratic fundraising in Oklahoma
Tennessee
Delegates to win:64
What to watch: Overall, Democrats are more moderate than their counterparts in other regions of the country. Clinton beat Sanders by 2 to 1 in the 2016 state primary. This year, more moderate candidates put more emphasis on Tennessee, while the Sanders campaign spent relatively little time or resources on the state.
John Geer, professor of political science at Vanderbilt University and director of the Vanderbilt poll, said that Sanders could win if the voices of the moderates were divided.
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Texas
Delegates to win: 228
What to watch: Texas – long a reliable republican state and historically neglected by Democratic presidential candidates – suddenly finds itself in unknown territory: a state courted in the middle of a stormy Democratic presidential season.
The Lone Star State is a major award, benefiting from the third largest number of delegates in the entire primary season, behind California and New York.
Biden ran most Texas race polls until January (although with margins ranging from 1 to 20 percentage points), but four polls released this week all found Sanders 4 to 15 points ahead percentage.
Survey:Bernie Sanders leads Democratic primary candidates with Texas Latino voters
Utah
Delegates to win: 29
What to watch: Like California, Utah is a new addition to the Super Tuesday slate after increasing its primary. Another state abandoned the caucus format for presidential primaries after 2016 – although caucuses will still be held this year for other races.
Unaffiliated voters represent more than 20,000 of the 87,224 registered voters in the state and can vote in the Democratic primary.
Sanders received almost 80% of the votes in 2016 caucuses. A Deseret News / Hinckley Institute of Politics poll released on Thursday found him to be the top choice of 28% of Democratic voters in Utah, ahead of Bloomberg (19% ), Warren (15%) and Biden (6%).
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Vermont
Delegates to win: 16
What to watch: Sanders’ home state is probably an easy choice for the three-term senator (who has been elected to state congress eight times).
In 2016, Sanders defeated Clinton in Vermont with 86% of the vote.
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Virginia
Delegates to win: 99
What to watch: Virginia, which was once a Republican stronghold, turned blue in the last election. Its Democratic voters tend to lean more moderately, giving Clinton a nearly 30-point victory over Sanders in 2016.
Polls indicate that the moderates could split their votes between Biden and Bloomberg, which has put its vast resources to work for the state, opening more than half a dozen offices.
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American Samoa Democrat Caucus
Delegates to win: 6
What to watch: Clinton won the American territory in 2016 with almost 73% of the vote against 27% for Sanders.
Voting site FiveThirtyEight gives Biden and Sanders roughly the same chances of winning caucuses.
Contributors: Susan Page, Rick Jervis, Gabrielle Canon, Joey Garrison, Marco della Cava and Nicholas Wu, USA TODAY; Jacy Marmaduke, The Coloradoan; Nora Hertel, St. Cloud (Min.) Times; Lexi Peery, The Spectrum (St. George, Utah); Chris Casteel, the Oklahoman; Natalie Allison, The Tennessean; The Associated Press
