The search for a Democrat to challenge Republican President Donald Trump in the November 3 election narrowed to a choice between Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden, who staged a comeback in Super Tuesday voting to become the undisputed standard-bearer of the party’s moderate wing.

Biden has won 10 of the 14 states up for grabs on March 3. The former vice president roared ahead in the overall tally of delegates who will choose a presidential nominee at the Democratic convention in July.

Biden overturned predictions to narrowly take the key state of Texas from his main challenger, Sanders. He also won the primaries in Virginia, North Carolina, Alabama, Tennessee, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Minnesota and Massachusetts. 

However, leftist Sanders won big in California — the biggest prize of the night — as well as in Colorado and Utah. He also won from his home state of Vermont. 

Biden, whose campaign had been on life support just weeks ago, registered surprise victories in Texas and Massachusetts. Tallies after March 3 showed Biden leading Sanders in delegates overall by 433-388.

Either of the candidates need at least 1,991 of the 3,979 pledged delegates to win the presidential nomination of the Democratic Party. 

Bloomberg drops out of the race

Biden’s strong performance ended Sanders’ status as the Democratic front-runner and led former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg to drop out of the race. Bloomberg gave up his presidential campaign and endorsed Biden, after spending hundreds of millions of dollars of his own money on ads across the United States. But Bloomberg failed to deliver convincing results on March 3, the biggest day of voting in the Democratic nomination campaign with contests in 14 states across the country.

He said he was endorsing Biden because he had the best shot at beating Trump. The media billionaire did not say whether he would spend part of his fortune to help Biden, but Bloomberg’s absence from the race will help the former vice president. Both men appeal to the centrist wing of the Democratic Party.

In another move that could reshape the race, Elizabeth Warren, 70, is “talking to her team to assess the path forward,” a campaign aide said. The liberal senator, who was seeking to become the nation’s first female president, had disappointing results across the board on March 3, including coming in third in her home state of Massachusetts. If Warren drops out, Sanders might benefit from some of her supporters shifting to him.

Tough fight ahead 

Now Sanders and Biden will likely battle tooth-and-nail over the next several weeks to determine which ideological course the party takes in the run-up to the November 3 general election against Republican President Donald Trump.

Sanders, 78, is a staunch advocate for government-run healthcare and other policies that would redistribute wealth and attack income inequality. Biden, 77, adopts a more traditional Democratic platform and has warned that Sanders' healthcare plan is financially unfeasible.

Sanders wants to establish a free universal healthcare system, forgive student loan debt and enact the “Green New Deal” of sweeping economic policies to fight climate change. 

Biden has warned that Sanders’ progressive positions would result in him losing large swaths of the nation to Trump should he be the nominee. That argument was buttressed by Biden’s success on March 3 in states such as North Carolina, won by Trump in 2016, and Minnesota, a top Trump target this year.

Biden has a prime opportunity as the primary calendar shifts to moderate Midwestern states such as Michigan and Ohio, where both he and Sanders will battle for working-class voters. Georgia, with its large black population, could hand Biden another commanding win. And looming large is Florida, with its 219 delegates, where polls have shown Biden with a steady lead in the state. To win those states, Biden will have to build the kind of electoral coalition he began to assemble on March 3.

Already strong with African-American voters, Biden showed newfound strength on March 3 with the kind of suburban, affluent white voters who had gravitated to fellow candidate, Senator Elizabeth Warren and former opponents Pete Buttigieg and Senator Amy Klobuchar.

Biden was also the favorite of voters who want a return to the policies of his old boss, former President Barack Obama. Those who favor more dramatic change sided with Sanders, exit polls showed.

Biden has to worry about Sanders’ popularity with Latinos, the fastest-growing segment of the Democratic Party. Sanders, by winning big in the state of California — which sends 415 pledge delegates — signalled that his fight to win the Democratic nomination to challenge Trump was far from over.

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