It’s Joe Biden all the way to November

Joe Biden will be the Democratic presidential nominee after another ­series of crushing primary wins against Bernie Sanders.

Joe Biden looks unbeatable heading into the Democrats’ national convention in July. Picture: AFP

Joe Biden will be the Democratic presidential nominee to challenge Donald Trump after another ­series of crushing primary wins against Bernie Sanders.

Despite the losses, the 78-year old Senator Sanders did not ­immediately pull out of the race, triggering speculation he may continue to fight despite having no realistic path to the nomination.

The former vice-president thrashed his democratic socialist rival in the delegate-rich states of Florida and Illinois and in Arizona.

The prize for the three states is 441 Democratic delegates, 11 per cent of the national total, guaranteeing that the 77-year-old Mr Biden will be crowned as the party’s nominee at the Democratic National Convention in Milwaukee in July.

Despite the victories, Mr Biden struck a subdued tone in his victory speech, filmed at his home in Delaware, calling first for Americans to stick together to defeat the coronavirus.

He said his campaign had “a very good night”.

“We’ve moved closer to securing the Democratic Party’s nomination for president,” he said, “and we’re doing it by building a broad coalition that we need to win in November.”

In Florida, with 219 delegates at stake, Mr Biden won in a landslide with 61.7 per cent of the vote to 22.9 per cent for Senator Sanders with almost 95 per cent of votes counted.

In Illinois, with 115 delegates, Mr Biden also won easily with 59.3 per cent of the vote to 35.8 per cent for Senator Sanders with more than 75 per cent of votes counted.

In Arizona, which was worth 67 delegates, Mr Biden was leading Senator Sanders 42.3 per cent to 29.5 per cent with 67 per cent of the vote counted.

 

Unless Senator Sanders quits the race in the days ahead, he will come under severe pressure from Democratic Party leaders to withdraw rather than risk fracturing the unity of the party in the lead-up to the election campaign against Mr Trump.

Mr Biden also used his victory speech to appeal to Senator Sanders’s army of young supporters to join with him to challenge the President in November.

“Senator Sanders and his supporters have brought remarkable passion and tenacity to these ­issues, and together they have shifted the fundamental conversation in the country,” Mr Biden said.

“And let me say, especially to the young voters who have been inspired by Senator Sanders: I hear you. I know what is at stake. And I know what we have to do.

“Our goal as a campaign, and my goal as a candidate for president, is to unify our party — and to unify our nation.”

Ohio, which has 136 delegates, was scheduled to vote on Wednesday but delayed its poll at the last minute to prevent crowds gathering at a time when the country is locking itself down in the face of the coronavirus pandemic.

Mr Biden won Florida on the back of strong support from ­African-Americans, from elderly white voters and also from the state’s fiercely anti-socialist Cuban and Latin American immigrants.

More than a quarter of Democrat primary voters in Florida are Africa-American, while two-thirds are over 50 and 60 per cent describe themselves as conser­vative, giving the moderate Mr Biden a significant demographic advantage over his liberal rival.

Senator Sanders, a democratic socialist, fell sharply in the polls in Florida after he recently praised the education policies of the late Cuban dictator Fidel Castro.

The three primary contests were held despite fears that the coronavirus crisis would keep voters away from the polls and severely limit the supply of poll workers to oversee the ballots.

Voters were asked to keep space between each other and were provided with hand sanitisers while poll workers disinfected equipment inside voting booths.

In Florida, voting booths were moved away from nursing homes and other at-risk members of the community. Many voters turned up to booths in all three states wearing face masks.

Ohio Governor Mike DeWine ordered the state’s health director to shut down the planned polls because of the public health emergency. The state’s primary will now be held on June 2.

“It was simply untenable for us to continue telling Ohioans, go to the polls. So the governor made a difficult but ultimately the right decision,” Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose said.

Four other states, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland and Georgia have also moved their primary contests to a later date.

If the pandemic continues for months, the Democratic ­National Committee may consider cancelling the party’s convention in July.

Cameron Stewart is also US contributor for Sky News Australia