March 1, also known as Super Tuesday, marked the biggest day for the presidential primaries.
Ten out of 11 participating states were the same for Democratic Party and Republican Party: Arkansas, Massachusetts, Texas, Vermont, Alabama, Georgia, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Virginia and Minnesota. Colorado in for Democrats and Alaska for Republican were the difference.
The point of the primaries is to accumulate delegates. These delegates represent the votes necessary to nominate a presidential candidate for either party. The Democratic party requires 2,383 delegates and GOP require 1,237.
To put the outcome of the votes simply, Donald Trump won for the GOP and Hilary Clinton won in the Democrat race.
Trump took seven states, Cruz took three and Rubio took a surprising first state out of 15 in Minnesota. Clinton locked in seven states while Sanders secured four. However, the important numbers are the Delegates awarded from those states.
Clinton received 486 (1,034 total) to Sanders’ 321 (408 total). Trump Received 237 (319 total) while Cruz received 209 (226 total) Rubio 94 (110). There are two other candidates in the GOP race by the names of Ben Carson received 3 (8 total) and John Kasich received 19 (25 total).
But the most important number has to be the one reported by MSNBC which detailed to the voter numbers comparing 2008 to 2016 in which Democrats had a 8,228,763 voter turnout in 2008 and only 5,557,243 this past Tuesday. Republicans on the other hand came out in an unprecedented amount of 8,307,884 this Tuesday when in 2008 they only had 5,025,685-voter turnout.
Super Tuesday tells the story of who is likely to be selected by each party to run for President in the general election.
However it does not mark the end of the primary elections. There are more votes in the remaining 35 states lasting until June 7 with the final states voting, but Washington D.C. truly ends the primaries on June 14 voting for the Democratic side.
The candidates began to give speeches following the closing of the polls, beginning with Clinton from Miami.
Clinton said, “If we all do our part, we can restore our common faith in our common future, that’s the spirit powering this campaign.”
Clinton turned her focus Donald Trump by taking jabs at him saying, “We know we got work to do. That work is not to ‘make America great again’, American never stopped being great. We have to make America whole.” Followed by chants of USA from the crowd. Clinton even commented on Trumps biggest stance on a giant wall across the border shouting, ““Instead of building walls, we’re going to break down barriers.”
Donald Trump spoke after being introduced by former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, focusing on Hilary Clinton after listening to her speech saying “She wants to make America whole again, and I’m trying to figure what that’s all about, ‘make America great again’ is much better than make America whole again.”
Trump continued to his raucous attendance making claims that many of the major countries, especially China, leaders are “too smart for our leaders.”
Marco Rubio, in Miami spoke to his home supporters, “Five days ago we began unmask the true nature of the front runner of this race. Five days ago we began to explain to the American people that Donald Trump is a con artist.”
Bernie Sanders in his home state of Vermont with crowd roaring “feel the Bern” staying on message said, “Together what we are going to do is create an economy that works for all of us, not just the people on top (the 1%).” Sanders continued on message saying, “We are going to invest for our young people, in education and jobs, not jails or incarceration.”
Sanders and his team believe his campaign is vital to this country stating, “This campaign isn’t just about electing a president, it is about making a political revolution.” Which apparently seems to be the rallying cry for all candidates except Clinton, who seem to believe America hasn’t been great and is deep need of reform and major change.
Sanders also described the current election and why it’s important by saying, “We can disagree in a democracy and that’s what a democracy is all about.”
That’s all these elections are, the debates between disagreements on policies between individual citizens choosing their potential next President.