Across 15 states and one territory, American voters will vote on Tuesday on the occasion of “Super Tuesday”, a crucial date in the calendar of presidential primaries in the United States, but which this year should confirm the inexorability of a duel Trump-Biden in November.
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Traditionally, this election day propels candidates towards the nomination, or on the contrary dampens the aspirations of some.
On the Republican side, more than a third of the delegates responsible for nominating the party’s candidate for the presidential election are to be obtained on March 5.
With the exception of Sunday’s primary in Washington, the capital of the United States, won by Nikki Haley, the ex-president won all the states that have already voted in primaries ahead of Super Tuesday.
And Tuesday promises to be the day of last chance for her only rival still in the running, Ms. Haley.
For Democrats, the suspense is even less suspenseful since outgoing President Joe Biden should undoubtedly be the candidate for his party.
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Here are some things to follow for this unusual Super Tuesday:
Tens of millions of Americans are called to the polls, from Maine in the far northeast of the United States, to California on the west coast, to Texas in the south, and even to American Samoa, small territory in the Pacific.
Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, and Virginia will also vote.
In the past, success on “Super Tuesday” required tireless field work, the ability to raise funds, and significant momentum.
AFP
This vote across the country was an opportunity for the candidates to demonstrate their ability – or not – to mobilize voters with very different profiles and geographical origins.
Joe Biden does not have a serious rival for the nomination, a typical fact for an outgoing president.
AFP
But more unusual, Donald Trump, as an ex-president trying to return to the White House, has crushed the Republican competition thus far.
At stake Tuesday are 874 delegates out of the 2,429 total who will nominate the Republican Party’s presidential candidate at the convention in July.
Enough to offer the ex-businessman an almost insurmountable lead from the beginning of March.
His campaign team predicts he will win 773 delegates on “Super Tuesday” and be mathematically unbeatable two weeks after that.
The only one still standing in the way of the septuagenarian, the former governor of South Carolina, Ms. Haley says that the 40% of the votes she won in New Hampshire and her home state show a Republican Party still divided on Donald Trump.
AFP
She also maintains that her chances would be much higher than those of the ex-president to beat Joe Biden in November, a duel between a septuagenarian and an octogenarian that no one wants, she says.
The former United States ambassador to the UN under the same Donald Trump had pledged in the past to remain a candidate at least until “Super Tuesday”.
For experts, if she has held on until then, it is mainly in the hope that Donald Trump will be prevented from competing in November due to his legal setbacks or potential health concerns.