But between the coronavirus beginning to ravage the nation, the unprecedented, widespread closures that have shuttered public spaces across the country and Joe Biden’s now-commanding lead over Bernie Sanders — in polls released on the eve of the March 17 contests, Biden holds double-digit leads across all four states — the primaries are flying below the radar for many Americans.
Last week, officials in Arizona, Florida, Illinois and Ohio rejected calls to postpone Tuesday’s primaries, saying that they would make accommodations, including extending early-voting hours, to prevent large crowds from gathering. But on Monday, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine asked a court in Columbus for a last-minute postponement of the primary.
When the court refused, saying it was too late to postpone, the state’s health department ordered the polling places shuttered — despite a lack of clarity about how, or even if, voters might be able to cast ballots in the primary. The Ohio Supreme Court later effectively upheld the decision to close the polls.
Here’s a state-by-state look at the map for Tuesday:
Democrats are hoping that Tuesday’s presidential primary is the springboard to flipping Arizona in November. President Donald Trump won the state by just 4 points in 2016, and polls conducted there show Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders are both competitive against Trump in the general election.
Arizona will likely be the closest of the four states voting on Tuesday, according to pre-election polls. But Biden still holds a double-digit lead over Sanders in poll after poll — despite Sanders’ enduring, though not overwhelming, advantage among Latino voters.
Clinton defeated Sanders in Arizona four years ago. 56 percent to 41 percent, and carried all nine of the state’s congressional districts. Polls suggest Biden is on pace for a similar victory, barring a surprise.
The state is going ahead with its primary despite the coronavirus outbreak. Many voters cast their ballots by mail, but there is still significant disruption. In Maricopa County — which includes Phoenix and is home to roughly 60 percent of registered voters — most polling places are closed for safety reasons. Instead, the county is operating about 150 vote centers on Tuesday, where voters can cast their ballots regardless of where they live within the county.
Bernie Sanders was blown out by Hillary Clinton in Florida in 2016 — and his prospects are no more promising in 2020.
Polls show Joe Biden with a two- or three-to-one advantage over Sanders, whose lack of support from older Democrats makes him particularly ill-suited for a state that is a magnet for retirees from the eastern third of the nation.
Moreover, Sanders’ advantage with Latino voters in other states doesn’t translate to Florida, where many Hispanics are either immigrants or descend from immigrants from Caribbean and Latin American countries whose leftist leaders they despise. Polls show Sanders, who has praised some of the actions of those authoritarian governments, trailing Biden among Hispanic voters in Florida.
The state has shuttered and consolidated a number of polling places because of the coronavirus outbreak. The state Democratic Party on Monday identified 91 precincts that were closed after GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis ordered elections officials not to house polling places in nursing homes or assisted-living facilities.
But DeSantis resisted calls to reschedule the presidential primaries. “We’re definitely voting,” he told reporters in Tallahassee last Friday. “They voted during the Civil War. We’re going to vote.”
Polls close in virtually all of Florida at 7 p.m. Eastern — but remain open an hour later in portions of the Panhandle in the Central Time Zone.
Bernie Sanders had the Democratic establishment on edge four years ago when he stormed out of Michigan victorious and nearly beat Hillary Clinton in her home state of Illinois a week later. But in 2020, neighboring Michigan delivered a 16-point rout for Biden and has deflated the Vermont senator’s campaign here.
Mike Bloomberg had started to make inroads here but when he, Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar folded their campaigns, most of their moderate supporters — and their donors — joined the Biden camp. Gov. J.B. Pritzker also delivered his endorsement to Biden on primary eve.
A WGN-TV/Emerson College poll last week showed Biden leading Sanders by 20 percentage points among likely voters in Illinois.
Sanders recently rallied in Chicago with Rep. Chuy Garcia and other local Latino officials to help shore up his support. But the cloud hanging over the Tuesday primary is the coronavirus outbreak. Schools have been ordered closed and polling stations are being moved out of senior centers as the number of cases tick up, so it’s unclear what voter turnout will look like.
The saga of Ohio’s primary adds significant uncertainty to a race that otherwise seems one-sided. Biden led Sanders in the latest poll by 23 points — in a state Clinton carried by 13 points four years ago, winning all but 15 of the state’s 88 counties.
Gov. Mike DeWine’s Monday night order closing the polling places came only about eight hours before they were set to open. DeWine said Secretary of State Frank LaRose would petition the courts “to extend voting options so that every voter who wants to vote will be granted that opportunity.”
But it’s unclear how that opportunity would be extended, or when.
The ambiguity extends beyond the presidential race. Ohio was set to hold all its primaries for the 2020 elections on Tuesday, including for Congress and state legislature.
Source: politico.com
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