Donald Trump and Joe Biden were the undisputed winners of the big “Super Tuesday” election, when tens of millions of Americans voted in 15 states and one overseas territory, and there is no doubt that they will
soon be able to seal their presidential candidacy
for the party. Republican and Democrat because in their respective primaries they won overwhelmingly in almost all the districts at stake.
But a finer analysis of the results shows
warning signs for both candidates
, which could put their ambition to reach the White House at risk.
After Super Tuesday, Trump already obtained about 800 of the 1,250 necessary delegates and is stroking his nomination and Biden is walking free, without major rivals.
Thus,
they will reissue the 2020 duel
and for now the polls for the November 5 general elections indicate that the Republican is two points ahead of the president, according to a RealClearPolitics average.
Any detail
could tip the balance
and in that sense Tuesday's massive election
leaves some clues
.
Haley's votes, a thorn in Trump's side
The former president won by a wide margin in every battleground state
except progressive, tiny Vermont
.
"There has never been anything so conclusive. This was an incredible night, an incredible day. It has been an incredible period in the history of our country," Trump said after the results were known.
In his speech, he ignored the victory of Nikki Haley, his former ambassador to the United Nations, in Vermont, where she beat him by 4 points.
Haley finally dropped out of the race and it is possible that with her she
will take the votes of the moderate voter
within the Republican Party, who is tired of chaos and Trump's style and wants to return to "normality" with a predictable country, open to world and with global leadership.
While Trump won the rest of the battleground states, Haley's effective protest candidacy garnered at least 35 percent of the vote in Massachusetts and Virginia, 34 percent in Colorado, and at least 23 percent in Maine , Minnesota and North Carolina.
Another piece of information should worry Trump.
In North Carolina, for example, 4 in 5 Haley voters told CNN at the exit polls that
they would not commit to supporting the mogul if he won in November.
Additionally, about 3 in 10 Republican voters said Trump
would be unfit
to be president if he is convicted of a crime.
Haley, 52, also played the age card.
She attacked Trump, 77, on the issue and demanded that he take an intellectual aptitude test.
She proclaimed that Americans are tired of the Biden-Trump duel and that a “generational change” is necessary in the White House.
In fact, she would have beaten Biden by a greater margin than Trump, polls indicate.
Haley's future was unknown until this Wednesday, when she decided to end her campaign.
With only 62 delegates, it was, however,
a huge annoyance for Trump,
who did not want to waste more time and money internally and sought to focus right now on his fight with Biden and his judicial problems.
Beyond some better-than-expected results,
Haley had no chance of winning the nomination.
But it doesn't really matter if he's still in the race or not.
His votes showed that there is an anti-Trump percentage among moderate Republicans who
are not willing to vote for the magnate
, even though he is their party's candidate.
Haley was also strong
among the younger and more educated sectors.
This electorate can be decisive in a close election like the one that the polls announce for November.
Trump
is a god for his bases
, but in the United States the candidate wins who manages to conquer that moderate and independent fringe that usually leans from one side to the other.
The mogul should stop calling Haley an “airhead” and
try to convince those voters.
The vote protests against Biden
Without major rivals, President Biden continued his winning streak by even wider margins than Trump's, far from the complicated internal race he had in 2020, when he lost at the beginning against Bernie Sanders and managed to come back after "Super Tuesday."
But this year's results revealed
a threat that is growing within his party
and that he must urgently address if he wants to stay in the White House
: the "uncommitted" vote of progressive protest
against his management of the war in Gaza is growing everywhere. the country.
The first warning sign was last week in Michigan, where
13% of the votes chose the “non-committed” option
promoted by a movement of Arabs and Muslims living in that state, and was also supported by young people and university students.
But it was not an isolated phenomenon because
the trend continued this “Super Tuesday.”
This option obtained about 20% of the vote in Minnesota, after pro-Palestinian activists promoted a protest vote.
Biden won that state by seven points in 2020 and cannot afford to lose it.
Michigan voted for Trump in 2016 and Biden won it back by just a few votes four years later, a turnaround that was vital to reaching the White House.
This protest movement was not exclusive to the north of the country.
A similar “unpledged delegate” option garnered 7% of the vote in Colorado and another so-called “no preference” garnered 12% in North Carolina.
A recent Fox News poll indicated that
65% disapproved of Biden's management
of the conflict in the Middle East.
With an eye on the internal, the president has been sharpening his language to refer to his ally Israel and seek a solution in Gaza.
This weekend Vice President Kamala Harris called for a six-week ceasefire and said that people in Gaza “are hungry, in inhumane conditions and humanity is forced to act.”
Biden, 81,
is already facing the problem of his age,
which raises distrust even among his own ranks.
A New York Times/Siena poll revealed that 61% of those who voted for him in 2020 today do not believe he is qualified to be president.
The color data was the only defeat that Biden suffered so far in the primaries.
It happened in American Samoa, a remote archipelago in the middle of the Pacific, where
a practically unknown businessman, Jason Palmer, triumphed
.