Ohio will postpone the Democratic primary scheduled for Tuesday ahead of the US presidential election next November for public health reasons due to the dangerous nature of the coronavirus epidemic, the state governor said on Monday.
Mike DeWine made the announcement when a state judge refused earlier today to approve a request to postpone the poll. DeWine said the director of health authorities in Ohio would order the closure of polling stations as part of the health measures taken to combat the spread of the virus. "At a time when we are facing an unprecedented public health crisis, conducting an election tomorrow would force poll workers and voters to place themselves in an unacceptable health risk situation from contracting the coronavirus," he said. he said on Twitter.
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The Ohio Department of Health has appealed Judge Richard Frye's decision, as the epidemic has closed schools and restaurants and banned large rallies in the United States. The primaries scheduled for Florida, Arizona and Illinois on Tuesday are to go as planned.
On Sunday, the United States Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommended that events with more than 50 people be canceled or postponed for the next eight weeks. President Donald Trump asked the Americans on Monday to avoid gathering more than 10 people.
The Illinois Election Commission said most of the votes for the state primary have already been cast, with 504,000 independent and democratic voters going to the polls early and more than 294,000 ballots mailed.
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An increasing number of advance votes was also noted in Florida, the largest state at stake during this new stage of the marathon of the Democratic primaries. Some 1.1 million voters have already voted, according to figures released Sunday by a representative of the Democratic Party.
Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders clashed head-to-head for Sunday for the first time in a debate, after which the Vermont senator, outstripped in the nomination contest by former vice-president, questioned the wisdom of maintaining the primaries on Tuesday.