Category Archives: US elections 2020

Bernie Sanders reassesses campaign after Biden builds formidable lead

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The Vermont senator’s presidential campaign has seen little but bad news recently as it admits ‘losing the battle over electability’

The Vermont senator Bernie Sanders got thumped in the latest round of Democratic presidential primary contests and, once again, Sanders and his team are reassessing their path forward.

It’s becoming a familiar cycle: former vice-president Joe Biden beats Sanders, the darling of progressive grassroots voters; the Sanders campaign concedes the situation isn’t ideal, and spends some time reassessing. That’s what happened earlier this month after the Super Tuesday contests on 3 March, and this Tuesday night and Wednesday morning.

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Sanders to ‘assess campaign’ after Biden sweeps to victory amid coronavirus crisis – live updates

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News of Bernie Sanders assessing his campaign comes after Joe Biden made an overture to Sanders supporters last night.

In a video following Biden’s wins, Biden said he and Sanders shared common goals on regarding healthcare, inequality and the climate crisis.

“So let me say especially to the young voters who have been inspired by Senator Sanders, I hear you. I know what to stake, [...]

I know what we have to do. Our goal is as a campaign, and my goal as a candidate for president is to unify this party, and then to unify the nation.

The Sanders’s campaign has just issued the following statement via campaign manager Faiz Shakir:

The next primary contest is at least three weeks away. Sen. Sanders is going to be having conversations with his supporters to assess his campaign. In the immediate term, however, he is focused on the government response to the coronavirus outbreak and ensuring that we take care of working people the most vulnerable

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Sanders pressured to exit in push for unity against twin threats: virus and Trump

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Joe Biden’s latest string of victories prompts renewed calls for senator to call it quits for the national good

For more than three years it seemed impossible to millions of Americans that anything could be more important than voting for an alternative to Donald Trump.

Yet right now the US president is no longer seen as the most pressing threat to national security. The coronavirus crisis has temporarily turned the US presidential election into a sideshow.

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Biden wins Florida and Illinois primaries as he edges towards Democratic nomination – live

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Bernie Sanders is not currently winning a single Florida county, underscoring the scale of Joe Biden’s victory there.

Bernie Sanders got crushed in Florida in 2016, but he still managed to win 9 counties and get 33% of the vote.

Now looks like he's not going to win single county and is just shy of 23%. pic.twitter.com/E5a4iNMKLM

Joe Biden will soon start delivering a primary-night speech after winning Florida and Illinois. (Watch his remarks here.)

Biden is hoping to pull off a sweep tonight once Arizona’s polls close in about 45 minutes.

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Joe Biden’s pledge to pick a female vice-president smells like tokenism | Arwa Mahdawi

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Of course I want him to choose a woman as his running mate. But his grand gesture feels more like pandering than policy

Stacey Abrams? Kamala Harris? Elizabeth Warren? Nobody knows for sure whom Joe Biden will choose as a running mate if – as is almost certain – he wins the Democratic nomination, but we do know it will be a woman.

“I’ll pick a woman to be vice-president,” Biden promised during Sunday’s presidential debate with Bernie Sanders. “There are a number of women qualified to be president tomorrow.” While none of those eminently qualified women will be president any time soon, one lucky lady may have the privilege of playing second fiddle to a gaffe-prone white guy. To cement his position as intersectional male feminist of the year, Biden also promised to appoint an African American woman to the supreme court.

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Three Democratic primaries due but Ohio cancelled amid coronavirus crisis – live updates

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Florida, Illinois, Arizona go to polls against backdrop of emergency measures and disruption that have cancelled Ohio primary

It was an unprecedented move to cancel the Ohio primaries at the 11th hour due to the coronavirus outbreak.

Republican Governor Mike DeWine failed to get a judge to halt the primary Monday evening, even though he contended the election results wouldn’t be viewed as legitimate in light of the pandemic.

“Democrats now must to find a way to complete this primary given the uncertainty of when each state is going to vote and whether we’re even going to be able to have a convention in July.”

That was veteran Democratic consultant Simon Rosenberg yesterday reflecting the reality that the disruption caused by the coronavirus outbreak in the US is now so severe that there’s a real possibility that Democrats will have to rearrange their whole plan for nominating a challenger to Donald Trump.

Related: Three states hold primaries as coronavirus upends 2020 election

Related: Coronavirus news: UK measures to last at least 'several months' as restrictions increased globally – live updates

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Coronavirus latest: lockdown declared across New York, New Jersey and Connecticut – live

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Utah senator Mitt Romney appeared to endorse a key component of Democratic presidential platforms Monday: a living wage - if only temporarily.

NEW from @MittRomney:

“Every American adult should immediately receive $1,000 to help ensure families and workers can meet their short-term obligations and increase spending in the economy.”

Thank you Andrew Yang.

But...but...socialism!

Here’s what you may have missed in the rush:

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Tony Blair: nominating Bernie Sanders would be ‘an enormous gamble’

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Tony Blair has warned Democrats in the US that nominating Bernie Sanders to face Donald Trump for the presidency would be “an enormous gamble”, risking defeat on a similar scale to that suffered by the Labour Party under Jeremy Corbyn.

Related: How Bernie Sanders went from frontrunner to the last-chance saloon

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‘Sledgehammer on Trump, scalpel on Sanders’: Biden approaches key debate

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The coronavirus pandemic has shifted Sunday’s Democratic debate behind closed doors – but it is still hugely important

Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders will square off in the 11th Democratic debate on Sunday night, in a contest moved from Arizona to Washington DC and held without a live audience due to the coronavirus outbreak.

Related: Can Democrats unite the party in time for November's election?

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Trump says he takes ‘no responsibility’ for coronavirus failures as he declares national emergency – live

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Nearly 19,000 schools have or will close across the US, affecting more than 8.1m students and counting, according to Education Week, one of the few outlets tracking school closures nationally. There are roughly 76 million students in US schools.

That number will likely rise as coronavirus spreads to Midwest and rural areas of the country.

Update: At least 18,700 schools have closed or will close, affecting at least 8.1 million students, due to #coronavirus, as of today at 11 a.m. (Some of those schools have reopened.)

Six governors have ordered or asked schools to close; via @educationweek https://t.co/0U0CPCCyYm pic.twitter.com/yn5wwSvHVv

Hours before the House was scheduled to vote on a package that would provide assistance those affected by the coronavirus outbreak, President Trump criticized the proposal, throwing a compromise into question.

“We don’t think they’re giving enough,” Trump said, referring to Democrats during a midday press conference from the Rose Garden. “They’re not doing what’s right for the country.”

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Joe Biden: six key policies from his 2020 presidential campaign – video report

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Joe Biden has pulled off one of the greatest political comebacks in US politics and is now the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination. Here is a look at where the former vice-president stands on key issues including the economy, healthcare, education, immigration and gun control

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Bernie Sanders: six key policies from his 2020 presidential campaign – video report

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Bernie Sanders has formally announced he is suspending his presidential campaign for the 2020 Democratic nomination.

Here is a look back at the speeches that outline his views on key issues including the economy, the climate crisis, healthcare, immigration and gun control

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Pelosi slams Trump administration’s limited amount of coronavirus testing – live

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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is trying to wrap up her press conference. She’s been talking up the new legislation the Democrats introduced in the House this morning but she’s also not especially impressed by Donald Trump’s suspending entry for most passengers arriving in the US from Europe.

Related: Trump to suspend travel from Europe, excluding UK, amid coronavirus outbreak

Related: ‘He’s gonna get us all killed’: sense of unease after Trump coronavirus speech

She’s not trying out the microphone, she’s talking about dealing with the coronavirus outbreak in the US.

The House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is holding her press conference right now.

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Bernie Sanders stays in race and looks forward to debating Biden in Arizona – video

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Bernie Sanders will stay in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination despite suffering a series of sweeping losses to Joe Biden, saying on Wednesday he looked forward to a debate with the former vice-president on Sunday. Sanders acknowledged he was falling behind Biden in the count of delegates needed to win the nomination, but he said he was committed to the overarching goal of defeating Donald Trump in November's general election

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Trump reportedly to announce order calling for medical supplies to be US-made – live

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The administration celebrated the Supreme Court’s decision to allow the enforcement of a policy that makes asylum seekers wait in Mexico for US court hearings. The “Remain in Mexico” policy will be upheld while a lawsuit challenging it continues.

In a statement, White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham said, “Today’s order from the Supreme Court is a major victory for the Trump Administration.”

Related: 'We need the Wall!': Trump uses coronavirus to push his own agenda

The House approved a resolution to limit Donald Trump’s ability to order direct military action against Iran without authorization from Congress. The Senate has also passed the bill, but it’s expected to be vetoed by Trump.

Lawmakers introduced the bill after Trump ordered a strike to kill Iranian general Qasem Suleimani, bringing the US to the brink of war, without consulting Consulting congress.

Related: After Suleimani: Iran's scramble to recover from general's death

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Sanders stays, so his movement can live on by dragging Biden leftward

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Bernie Sanders vowed to attend the upcoming Democratic debate after a string of primary losses, and posed questions for his rival

From his hometown of Burlington, Vermont, Bernie Sanders got up to speak on Wednesday afternoon, after a disappointing night of watching the results from Tuesday’s primaries roll in.

Would he stay or would he go? For now, he stays, determined to fight on and try to drag the Democratic frontrunner, Joe Biden, to the left, so that even as Sanders’ race effectively peters out, his movement goes on.

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Millions of Democratic votes were lost in the primaries. Is this the fix? | Mohit Nair and Colin Cole

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Americans who vote early may ‘waste’ their vote on candidates who drop out of the race. There’s an easy way to remedy that

Across the country, millions of voters turned in early ballots for the US presidential primary elections, often voting for candidates no longer in the race on election day.

In Colorado and Texas, early voters for candidates other than Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders might have made a statement, but they didn’t have the chance to influence the primary election. Some of the estimated 20% of Californians who voted early asked for a do-over. In Minnesota, 40,000 people had reportedly cast their ballots a week before Super Tuesday – and days before Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar dropped out.

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‘We share a common goal’: Joe Biden after winning key battleground states – video

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Joe Biden won Michigan’s Democratic primary, seizing a key battleground state that helped propel Bernie Sanders’ insurgent candidacy four years ago. The former vice-president's victory in Michigan, alongside wins in Missouri and Mississippi, dealt a serious blow to Sanders, who is urgently seeking to jump-start his flagging campaign. Speaking in Philadelphia, Biden thanked Sanders and his supporters for their passion and made an appeal for party unity: 'We share a common goal and together we'll defeat Donald Trump'

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Joe Biden projected to win key state of Michigan in blow to Bernie Sanders – live

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Voters go to the polls in Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota, Michigan, Idaho and Washington state with the Vermont senator needing a boost

Bernie Sanders lost the crucial state of Michigan tonight, and things are not going to get easier for him next week.

Four states will hold primaries next Tuesday: Arizona, Florida, Illinois and Ohio.

The president of the liberal super PAC American Bridge is similarly referring to Joe Biden as the presumptive nominee after his wins tonight.

Our team @American_Bridge has been ready to support the eventual democratic nominee for the last 2 years. Our team has outspent Trump on in MI, PA, and WI. That work expands bigly tomorrow as we will be ALL IN to elect @JoeBiden as our next President

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Joe Biden spars with Michigan autoworker over guns – video

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Joe Biden, frontrunner for the US Democratic presidential nomination, got into a heated exchange with an autoworker at a campaign stop when questioned overwhether he was going to take away people’s guns. ‘You’re full of shit,’ Biden told the man, who accused him of ‘actively trying to end the second amendment’. The exchange came during a typical election-day voting photo shoot at Detroit’s first new auto assembly plant in decades, marking another episode of Biden’s propensity for going off-script and undercutting his campaign’s desired messaging

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