A resounding victory in South Carolina has thrust Joe Biden back into the race for the Democratic presidential nomination, but that could all change in two days when voters go to the polls in 14 “Super Tuesday” states.
With 48 percent of the vote in South Carolina, the former vice president more than doubled the 20 percent won by national frontrunner Bernie Sanders, reviving Biden’s campaign and positioning him as the senator’s leading rival.
“This is a big boost for us,” Biden said Sunday on CNN, but “we have a long way to go.”
Sanders continues to hold poll leads in many of the Super Tuesday states — including the biggest prize, California — and he had double-digit leads in two nationwide surveys released Friday.
“I think we’ve got a great chance to win in California, in Texas, in Massachusetts and a number of states,” Sanders said Sunday on CBS.
But into an already turbulent Democratic race — which has gradually winnowed down a record-large field — Biden’s victory Saturday injected a note of uncertainty.
“The biggest question is whether this will slingshot Joe Biden into victory in some Super Tuesday states,” said Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia.
The victory there, powered by support from black voters, was Biden’s first in the race, but came at a crucial time, helping dispel some earlier doubts about the 77-year-old’s energy level and broad appeal.
– The pressure to drop out –
South Carolina added another bit of clarity: billionaire businessman Tom Steyer, who spent a whopping $23 million campaigning in the state, dropped out of the race on Saturday after taking just 11 percent of the vote.
Pressure is beginning to mount on other trailing Democrats — including Senators Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar, as well as former Indiana mayor Pete Buttigieg, all in single digits in South Carolina — to follow Steyer’s example and throw their weight behind a frontrunner.
Buttigieg, Warren, Klobuchar, and billionaire Michael Bloomberg have all made it clear that they will stick around at least through Super Tuesday.
But Buttigieg, who won only 8 percent of the South Carolina vote after notching far better results in the earlier states, appeared to be softening his tone on Sunday.
The 38-year-old former mayor repeatedly told NBC that his focus now was to do “what is best for the party” in order to “end the Trump presidency.”
“We’ll be assessing at every turn,” he said, “not only what the right answer is for the campaign, but making sure that every step we take is in the interest of the party and that goal of making sure we defeat Donald Trump.”
