Overwhelming victories for Trump and Biden on Super Tuesday also raise red flags for both

Joe Biden and Donald Trump dominated the Super Tuesday primary elections. The former because, as the incumbent, he lacks any competition; the latter because he has a tight hold over the Republican base. Both ended the night having wrapped up their respective party’s nomination, although mathematically they will have to wait a week or two to make their victories official. The rapid and resounding victories of the two candidates leads to an inevitable rematch of the 2020 election, this time with Biden in the White House, and Trump in the opposition. It will force Americans to choose between two candidates who are clearly unpopular with the population as a whole. That outcome already seemed to be a foregone conclusion before the least contested Super Tuesday in history. Despite the candidates’ massive victories, the results of last night’s primaries issued warnings to them both.

The real race starts now. Following Nikki Haley’s withdrawal, Trump’s path to the nomination is completely clear. Haley exits having only managed to win in Washington, D.C., and Vermont, where Biden won by the largest margin in 2020. On the Republican side, the main question now is who the former UN ambassador’s voters will support; according to polls, they represent a mix of moderate anti-Trump old-school Republicans and disenchanted Biden supporters.

On the Democratic side, the president will deliver his State of the Union address on Thursday. The annual televised speech before both chambers of Congress is always a major date on the American political calendar. But this time it is crucial for Biden: what he says, how he says it and the image he projects before an audience of tens of millions of people will shape how the undecided voters who will determine the outcome of the election perceive him.

On Super Tuesday, Donald Trump won 14 of the 15 states holding Republican primaries. He lost only Vermont, a centrist state that tends to vote Democratic in presidential elections and has a moderate Republican governor. Trump won over two-thirds of the vote in Alabama (84%), Oklahoma (82%), Texas (78%), Tennessee (77%), Arkansas (76%), North Carolina (75%), Maine (72%), Minnesota (67%), Alaska (83%) and California (78%), and over 60% in Colorado, Massachusetts and Virginia. That means he won the vast majority of the 874 delegates at stake. He has 995 of the 1,215 he needs to secure the nomination. He can pass the threshold next Tuesday, with the 161 delegates up for grabs in Georgia, Hawaii, Mississippi and Washington State.

Biden won all 15 states (on the Democratic side there were primaries in Iowa, but not Alaska), in most places securing over 80% of the vote. His only defeat came in American Samoa — which does not vote in the presidential elections — where he lost to unknown businessman Jason Palmer 51% to 40%. In several states, there were significant percentages of “uncommitted” votes, punishing Biden for his pro-Israeli position in the Gaza war. Biden’s official mathematical nomination, however, may only come on March 19 because the Democratic primaries are running on a somewhat later schedule.

Both candidates are already focused on the November 5 presidential election, as their first reactions to Tuesday’s results indicated. Trump appeared alone on stage from his Mar-a-Lago mansion in Palm Beach, Florida, and avoided mentioning Haley. He launched an attack on Joe Biden in a disjointed speech that left clues as to the themes of his campaign. He talked about immigration and crime, two concepts that he links disregarding existing evidence, as well as inflation, the withdrawal from Afghanistan, the wars in Ukraine and Gaza and Covid.

While Trump does not want to mention Haley, the fact that she won over 30% of the vote in several states seems to indicate that a segment of Republican voters is not enthusiastic about Trump. And if Trump does not appeal to moderate Republicans, he has an even harder time with independents. The specter remains of the 2022 congressional elections in which the predicted red wave did not materialize because of extremist candidates.

If anything has become clear during the primaries, it is that neither of the two candidates are popular. Polls show that between 60 and 70% of the population would prefer that neither of them run. Both have baggage. Trump is unpopular among moderates, although he is leading in the polls for now. Biden’s age is a major concern (he is the first octogenarian US president), along with the perception that the economy is not doing well. Also, a large part of the population has concerns about the increase in illegal immigration and, among progressives, his support for Israel in Gaza.

The president has already received some serious warnings from his constituents. Following its success in the Michigan primary last week, the “uncommitted” campaign hastily organized by progressive groups and the Arab American community in several states to pressure the president for a ceasefire in Gaza scored a major victory in Minnesota with 19% of the vote. In North Carolina, that percentage was 12%. In Massachusetts it was over 9%, and in Colorado 7%, demonstrating the discontent among young people and progressives.

Thus far, the White House has said that it is listening to these voters and expresses confidence that, when the time comes in November, faced with the prospect of a new Trump term, they will return to the fold and cast their ballots for Biden.

Indeed, Biden’s main hope is that his base will mobilize to prevent Trump from winning. In his first message after the Super Tuesday victory, the president emphasized that point: “Tonight’s results leave the American people with a clear choice: Are we going to keep moving forward or will we allow Donald Trump to drag us backwards into the chaos, division, and darkness that defined his term in office?” he asked in a statement in which he quoted his rival several times.

Trump, meanwhile, faces a full court schedule. He has been found liable in civil cases for fraud, sexual abuse and defamation, but this month he is due in court to face a criminal case that could carry a prison term. He has three other pending criminal cases that he has been successfully delaying, but it is not out of the question that he will have to stand trial before the election in Washington and Georgia for his interference in the 2020 elections and in Florida for the classified documents case.

The November election will be decided in six hotly contested states (Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona and Nevada) where Biden won in 2020. It may be enough for Trump to win three to secure the election and, at least for the moment, polls show him leading in all of them.

The real electoral campaign begins now and will continue for eight months. This election is most unusual. It features two unpopular candidates, as well as voters’ concerns that include traditional issues — the economy and inflation, immigration, crime — along with others that were unheard of a few years ago, such as the defense of democracy. In addition, other factors unrelated to the candidates themselves, such as court cases and the progress of the wars in Gaza and Ukraine, are likely to tip the balance in November. A lot can happen in eight months.

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