Bernie was dealt a harsh blow on Tuesday, no doubt. Do the remaining states (yet to vote) in this race favor him or Joe?
The superdelegates sure won’t be on Bernie’s side should it come to a second ballot, so he can only get the nomination via direct first-ballot victory. Looks like he can only win if Warren drops out pronto, ***and ***Joe suddenly has some gaffes of a worse-than-usual nature, ***and ***Bernie somehow successfully jolts the youth into actually showing up to vote.
Somehow kicking butt next week, especially in Michigan.
Michigan is one of the must win states in the general and a surprising big Sanders win there, especially one that comes with a large young Black voter turnout for him, would change the narrative. With that narrative maybe then pulling out Florida and Ohio. Then he has an argument to make if it is no one with a majority and him close to Biden.
Get his supporters off of Facebook, Reddit, and Twitter and into the voting booths.
He has significant leads in every demographic under 45, which combine to over 55% of the electorate. Unfortunately for Sanders, those same demographics are showing up at less than half the rate of Biden’s supporters. If they actually SHOW UP, he has an uphill, but viable, path. If they continue to sit at home and rage at the unfairness of other people voicing their opinion, then he losing yet again to a “milquetoast Republican-lite”.
There would have to be a major shift for him to regain his momentum.
I agree that his best chance is to get out there and show that he can get young people to show up and vote. If he shows he can deliver a sizable youth vote at the polls, he has a shot at getting back into this.
I don’t see a path for him. With proportional delegate allocation, it’s really hard to cut into someone’s lead. Personally, I think his win in Michigan in 2016 was a fluke and Biden will actually carry this state (he’s got one vote from me here). Even if he wins say 50-30 with the rest scattered, that doesn’t translate into a delegate sweep. Biden can make that back in spades with a huge win in Georgia which he will definitely get. Add to that LA, MS, PA, DE, NJ, and likely NY. We’ve seen a remarkable turnaround in the past week, and barring another one this week I think the race is over.
While I do not see a path for Sanders, I am ever so slightly rueful about the fact that it won’t be Sanders on the debate stage against Trump. I don’t think Biden will be able to express the level of scathing contempt that Bernie can pull off. Biden is simply not in the same league as a debater. But, I hold fast to the dream in which Joe punches Trump right in the mouth, FTW.
I think he should show up at the convention, act insane and say "I’m not going to be ignored’ like Glenn Close did in fatal attraction.
Sanders is currently trailing Biden by 67 delegates, 582 vs 515. There are still a lot of outstanding delegates in states Sanders won like CO, CA, UT. TX is mostly a wash, TN & NC have a few Biden delgates outstanding too.
But again, I know there have been predictions but the delegate lead will likely narrow as more ballots are counted. There are 189 outstanding delegates in states Sanders won like CA, UT & CO; 26 outstanding in states Biden won, 33 in Texas (which was pretty much a tie), and 13 in overseas democrats.
It really depends on how Sanders does in industrial midwest and northeast states. The big delegates are in IL, OH, NY, MI. Not sure how he will do in those.
Also supposedly Warren is in talks with Sanders to try to unite their campaigns. Not sure if she will succeed or if her voters will go to Sanders, but if they do that’ll help Sanders narrow the gap even more.
You keep saying Texas was pretty much a tie, but Biden won Texas by 5 points. That’s a solid win, especially when a majority of polls in the past month showed Bernie winning there.
Well, let’s look at the upcoming primary calendar with number of delegates at stake in parentheses, not including superdelegates):
March 10
Idaho (20)
Michigan (125)
Mississippi (36)
Missouri (68)
North Dakota (14)
Washington (89)
Looking at that list and based on the general pattern that Sanders is stronger in the West and Biden in the South, then that’s not a terrible crop of states for Sanders IF he pulls off a good victory in Michigan. IF that happens, you could see him win MI, ID, ND and WA. 4/6 and the big prize could give him some momentum and change the narrative. If MI is essentially a draw, that generally probably helps slightly further the current Biden narrative. Biden wins MI decisively, things begin to look very dicey for Sanders.
March 14
Northern Mariana
I think we can agree this will have no big effect.
March 17
Arizona (67)
Florida (219)
Illinois (155)
Ohio (136)
Based on current polling, this is likely a much worse crop of states for Sanders and they are big ones. Unless he can win MI and get some momentum as I mentioned earlier, these states seem like very favorable for Biden and could be where he lands the knockout punch. But maybe a Warren endorsement solidifies a Sanders lead in Illinois and puts Ohio into play? That could even the delegate count out.
The race has changed quickly several times, so I don’t think any scenario is out of bounds at this point. I would not count Sanders out yet.
Indeed. I’ve been following the NPR Delegate Tracker pretty closely. At the moment they have Biden up 595-528 with 144 California delegates unallocated. Biden’s lead could certainly shrink to nearly nothing, but the map becomes a lot unfriendlier to Bernie in the weeks ahead. MI and WA may be his best chances among sizeable states, but I don’t see a blowout for him anywhere with huge delegate hauls. On the other hand, I can totally see Biden running up the score in PA, GA, FL, MD, NJ, and a few others.