Super Tuesday results: Biden sweeps the South, Sanders strong in the West, anemic outcome for Bloomberg
As Super Tuesday -- the single biggest day of voting -- came to a close, the candidates competed across 15 contests for a treasure chest of delegates, which were awarded across geographically and racially diverse parts of the country.
The stakes could not be higher as Democrats faced a significant turning point in the 2020 presidential race and were tested on a national scale.
Across 14 states -- Alabama, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Utah, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont and Virginia -- and one territory, American Samoa, 1,344 delegates were up for grabs. Results in delegate-rich California are still being calculated.
Here's how the day unfolded.
2:03 a.m. Biden projected to win Texas
Based on analysis of the vote, ABC News projects that Biden will win the Texas primary.
1:34 a.m. Biden gaining over Sanders in Texas
Biden seems to be closing the gap in Texas, with just about three fourths of the expected vote reporting; he now leads Sanders by 3 percentage points.
Turnout in the state has already passed 2016 levels, which was 1,435,895. So far, with 76% of the expected vote in, it's at 1,680,893 votes cast.
Hillary Clinton won the 2016 Democratic primary there, topping Sanders by over thirty points.
ABC News' Quinn Scanlan reports.
1:23 a.m. Los Angeles County registrar won’t extend polling hours
Los Angeles County Registrar Dean Logan apologized to voters who were still waiting in line to cast ballots after the polls were supposed to close, but said they would not extend polling hours despite Sanders’ legal filing.
The complaint said that multiple polling locations in the county experienced extreme wait times – some as long as four hours – to cast a ballot. The filing also highlighted a new proprietary voting system called “Voting Solutions for All People” that was being used for the first time on a wide scale.
The campaign asked for polls to remain open until 10 p.m. (PST) and to offer provisional ballots to any voters who arrived at the polling sites after 8 p.m.
KABC reported that the U.S. District Court didn’t schedule a hearing on the complaint filed by the Sanders’ campaign before 8 p.m.About 90 minutes after the polls had closed Logan tweeted a reminder to voters in line to stay there in order to cast their ballots.
ABC News’ Averi Harper and Zohreen Shah report
