Good morning, and welcome to not-so-Super Wednesday. Tuesday was super for Joe Biden’s presidential campaign in Minnesota, and that’s where we’ll start the Digest.
1. Biden wins Minnesota’s first Democratic presidential primary in 28 years. Former Vice President Joe Biden won Minnesota’s presidential primary Tuesday, propelled by the endorsement of Sen. Amy Klobuchar to an unexpected victory over Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. The Associated Press called the race for Biden about 45 minutes after polls closed. Biden hadn’t been seriously contesting Minnesota, which was expected to be a battle between Sanders, who won the state’s party caucuses in 2016, and Klobuchar. But Klobuchar dropped out of the race on Monday, endorsing Biden. That last-minute change scrambled the race, with Klobuchar’s supporters having to find a new candidate at the last minute. Biden, who had been in a distant fourth place in a MPR News/Star Tribune poll two weeks before the election, was trying to attract Klobuchar supporters on the basis of the Minnesota senator’s endorsement, while Sanders was hoping to capitalize on the withdrawal of his biggest rival here. “Words can't explain how excited I am,” said Corey Day, Biden’s state director, after the AP called the race for Biden. “Without [Klobuchar's] support, we could never have gotten to this place.” MPR News In terms of Minnesota delegates, Biden got 38, Sanders got 27 and Warren got 10. 2. It’s now a two person race nationally on the Democratic side. A resurgent Joe Biden scored sweeping victories across the country on Super Tuesday, backed by a diverse coalition that helped revitalize a moderate presidential bid teetering on the edge of disaster just days earlier. But progressive rival Bernie Sanders seized the day’s biggest prize with a win in California that ensured he would drive the Democrats’ nomination fight for the foreseeable future. And suddenly, the Democratic Party’s presidential field, which featured more than a half dozen candidates a week ago, transformed into a two-man contest. The two Democrats, lifelong politicians with starkly different visions for America’s future, were battling for delegates as 14 states and one U.S. territory held a series of high-stakes elections that marked the most significant day of voting in the party’s 2020 presidential nomination fight. The winner will take on President Donald Trump in the November general election. The Associated Press
3. Not much suspense on the Republican side in Minnesota. Minnesota Republicans delivered a decisive victory Tuesday to the lone name listed on their presidential primary ballot: Donald Trump. A comparatively small number of Republican voters appeared to have turned out at the polls, but party leaders said Tuesday’s turnout does not reflect the excitement of their base. “We know that there’s a lot of energy and enthusiasm for him from our entire state,” Republican Party Chairwoman Jennifer Carnahan said at a Make America Great Again watch party in Minneapolis. With more than half of precincts reporting, nearly 80,000 Minnesotans had showed up for the Republican primary, while more than 470,000 people participated in the contested Democratic race, according to the Secretary of State’s office. More than 97 percent of Republican voters had cast their ballot for Trump, and just 2.6 percent of Republican voters wrote in a name other than the president. Star Tribune
4. Secretary of State’s website links to partisan pollfinder. The official online poll finder posted by the Minnesota secretary of state’s office on Tuesday morning briefly directed people to the website of a liberal political action committee. Citizens trying to find their polling locations on Election Day were directed to the website of the Washington, D.C.-based Progressive Change Campaign Committee. The site asked for a name, email address and ZIP code, information not required to determine a polling location. Initially, Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon said he wasn’t aware of any redirection from his office’s site, although he acknowledged a glitch with one of the department’s computer servers that had slowed response time on the poll finder. By early Tuesday afternoon, however, Simon conceded that in trying to respond to overwhelming demand, the department had linked briefly to boldprogressives.org, and that it should not have happened. In trying to quickly restore the poll finder service, “a staff person diverged from our emergency plan and, in a serious lapse of judgment, linked to a partisan website that contained polling place information,” Simon said in a statement. “The moment this error was discovered, we corrected the link. The link in question was active for approximately 17 minutes.” MPR News
5. A lot more people voted in the primary than took part in caucuses four years ago. Minnesota’s first Super Tuesday primary appears to have accomplished what state lawmakers wanted when they ditched presidential caucuses: more voter participation. With 85 percent of precincts reporting at press time, nearly 815,000 Minnesotans cast ballots in Tuesday’s presidential primary. In 2016, just 318,000 people participated in caucuses statewide. Caucuses had long been criticized as being more appealing to party insiders rather than the typical voter. Long lines and slow results also frustrated participants in 2016. By eliminating them for picking presidential contenders, Minnesota lawmakers said they were encouraging more voters to participate. Pioneer Press Here are the results. Here’s a closer look at Minnesota results. | 