While the Iowa caucus, the first leg of the Democratic nomination contest for the presidential election of November 3, was held on February 3, "Le Monde" launches its campaign logbook. A daily update, five days a week until September, with campaign facts, political advertisements, polls, maps and figures that allow you to follow and experience the most important electoral competition in the world.
In just seventy-two hours, the face of the Democratic nomination contest has been completely transformed. The triumph, on February 29, in South Carolina, of the former vice-president Joe Biden, whose campaign was in agony, indeed started a rally of the camp which defends more moderate positions than those of Bernie Sanders , the senator from Vermont, big winner of the first states.
The youngest in the race, Pete Buttigieg, and the Minnesota senator Amy Klobuchar ended their candidacy and supported Joe Biden on the eve of the Super Tuesday strategic meeting during which fourteen states were pronounced, including California and Texas.
The results, Tuesday evening March 3, may have exceeded the expectations of the former vice president. While Bernie Sanders unsurprisingly won Vermont, his homeland, Utah and Colorado, Joe Biden won hands down in Virginia and North Carolina, states richly endowed with delegates. Then the loyalty of the African-American electorate allowed it to quickly add Alabama, Tennessee, Oklahoma, and Arkansas to its list of successes.
Joe Biden’s resurgence was not limited to the African American electorate. Beaten to death in New Hampshire on February 10, he made an unexpected breakthrough in the neighboring state of Massachusetts, ahead of Bernie Sanders despite the proximity of Vermont, and especially Elizabeth Warren, elected there. A cruel setback for the latter after benefits yet noticed in the democratic debates, including the last two in which she attacked the billionaire Michael Bloomberg, who entered the race late.
Only the feeling of urgency of Democratic voters, who anticipate a presidential election to which the outgoing president already devotes almost all his energy, can explain the incredible results obtained by Joe Biden in states where he has not even campaigned, such as Minnesota, Oklahoma, Maine or Massachusetts. This anxiety on the part of voters led to a useful vote reflex on Tuesday evening, whatever the glaring weaknesses of a septuagenarian quick to blunders and blunders, often less energetic during debates than his one year old Bernie Sanders, victim of a heart attack in October 2019.
