Moments before we went live on air at WABE, Nikki Haley suspended her presidential campaign. The South Carolina Republican lost all but one state to former President Donald Trump in the Super Tuesday contests.
In her announcement, the former U.N. ambassador did stop short of endorsing Trump, who is now the presumptive Republican nominee. For him to become the official Republican nominee, he still needs to earn 1,215 delegates.
But even with Haley exiting the race, she and several other Republicans and three Democrats will still technically be on the ballot during Georgia’s primary next Tuesday.
President Joe Biden won all his primaries during Super Tuesday except for American Samoa. Political consultant Rick Dent says the race to the White House is now a near binary choice between Biden and Trump, and the Democrat gains a small advantage. “(Biden) has suffered from (what) a lot of weak incumbents have suffered, and that is you’re compared against everybody.”
Emory professor Andra Gillespie cautioned that if Biden wants to win his reelection bid, he can’t take minority voters for granted. “If Democrats don’t have stratospheric turnout numbers with these groups and don’t get traditional breaks ... it’s not going to bode well.”
Thursday on “Politically Georgia”: Nikki Haley surrogate Eric Tanenblatt and Atlanta Journal-Constitution colleague Tamar Hallerman join the show.
*Quick programming note: On Tuesday, there were some technical difficulties during U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock’s interview, so we fully re-aired that conversation for our radio audience today.
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