Joe Biden had another big primary night. Now coronavirus is freezing the 2020 race.
Joe Biden’s victories Tuesday in another round of presidential primaries caps a whirlwind three weeks in which the former vice president engineered a shock political turnaround and became the Democratic Party’s likely nominee.
Now his campaign, and the rest of the primary itself, are about to come to a sudden and unprecedented halt.
A race that has moved at a breakneck pace this year is about to go on a quasi-hiatus, thanks to a global outbreak of the coronavirus that has disrupted most facets of American life and forced government leaders and campaign officials to rethink how they conduct elections.
“Many of the normal rules no longer apply,” said Rep. Colin Allred of Texas, who has endorsed Biden. “Many of the plans in place previously, whether it’s for campaigns or events or whatever it might be, they’re all on hold now.”
Following Biden’s blowout wins in Arizona, Florida and Illinois, he likely won’t face Bernie Sanders on the ballot again for at least 18 days. Georgia officials delayed their March 24 election until May, and lawmakers in Puerto Rico are on track to postpone their March 26 election until April. Several states with April and May primaries have already shifted their election dates back, and others are considering doing the same.
The 12th and final debate of the primary is supposed to take place in April, but the party has yet to set a date or location for it, and some Democrats question whether it will even occur. And both candidates have already sworn off the kind of on-the-ground campaigning that is normally the central focus of any race.
But nothing will overshadow the primary more than the growing and increasingly urgent response to the pandemic, including decisions from local and urgent government officials to temporarily close restaurants and the federal government’s attempts to craft an economic stimulus package.
“Nobody’s going to pay attention to them until this is, if not resolved, at least under control,” said one Democratic strategist. “Donors aren’t going to be in a mood to write a check with the sudden market crash, voters aren’t going to want to open the door for a stranger and if you try to talk about anything else it’s going to sound like you’re from outer space.”
After further extending his delegate lead to a nearly insurmountable level, Biden looked ahead to the general election in a livestreamed speech after the Florida and Illinois primaries were called. He made a direct appeal to Sanders supporters, saying they “have brought a remarkable passion and tenacity” the campaign, and pledged to unify the party and the country.
“Our campaign has had a very good night,” Biden said. “We’re moving closer to securing the Democratic Party’s nomination.”
Sanders wholly ignored Tuesday’s results, instead using a livestream address before all polls had closed to outline a series of proposals to combat the coronavirus outbreak, estimating that $2 trillion in government funding would be necessary to prevent death, job loss and economic catastrophe. He called for empowering Medicare to cover all medical bills during the emergency and said every American family should begin receiving monthly payments of $2,000, a basic income idea made popular by former presidential candidate Andrew Yang.
“We’re throwing out a lot of ideas,” Sanders said, acknowledging not all would pass Congress. “There will be a picking and a choosing here and there.”
Calls for Sanders to wind down his campaign started before Tuesday’s blowout, and they will likely now only intensify as he falls further behind Biden in the delegate count. Sanders campaign manager Faiz Shakir send in a statement Wednesday morning that the senator “is going to be having conversations with supporters to assess his campaign.”
But even as vote tallies stacked up against Sanders, some of his most fervent supporters urged their candidate to stay in the fight through the last primary in June, if simply to keep progressive issues at the forefront.
Larry Cohen, a longtime Sanders adviser and chairman of Our Revolution, an outside group supporting the Vermont senator, said the campaign didn’t need to have a fighting posture, but rather one that serves as a vehicle for an ongoing discussion.
“It would be fine to have vote-by-mail for the remaining states in May. But unless we moved to a national primary day, it makes a mockery of democracy if the remaining 1,600 delegates are simply given to Biden,” Cohen said. “I would also argue the result of that process will alienate millions and make it harder to defeat Trump.”
And cognizant that pushing Sanders out of the race might anger some of his supporters, even some Biden allies are emphasizing that they don’t think the senator should be forced to leave the race.
“I’m fine with him staying in the race and him competing for as long as he can,” said Allred, the Biden supporter.
The congressman added that he thinks Sanders should stay in the race until Biden officially clinches a majority of delegates, something that likely wouldn’t happen for another couple of months.
Both the Sanders and Biden campaigns have said they will replace in-person campaigning with digital outreach efforts, including the virtual town halls and speeches the two candidates have held in recent days. Campaign veterans say those events will likely continue in the coming weeks as the candidates try to maintain a public presence even while the public focuses elsewhere.
“Campaigns are going to have to get creative in the way they talk to voters,” said Steve Schale, a veteran Florida-based Democratic operative and strategist for a pro-Biden super PAC. “There’s no playbook for this.”
Between Sanders staying in the race and an unpredictable coronavirus climate, Biden won’t be able to pivot to the general election the way a candidate with his delegate advantage would normally be able to. But some Democrats don’t necessarily see that as a disadvantage.
“I was joking the other day, the best strategy for Biden would be to self-isolate until about October 24,” said Paul Maslin, a longtime Democratic pollster. “I don’t think there’s any great demand for him to be out there.”
McClatchyDC’s Adam Wollner contributed reporting.
This story has been updated.
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