[CSG PRINT] Trump beats Haley as Biden sweeps vote in Colorado’s Super Tuesday presidential primary (copy)
Donald Trump took an early lead over Nikki Haley in Colorado’s Republican presidential primary and kept it as returns posted Tuesday night. At the same time, President Joe Biden cruised to a win against long shot opponents in the state’s Democratic primary.
The Associated Press called the state for Trump and Biden less than 15 minutes after polls closed, adding the state to the two front-runners’ win columns on Super Tuesday, the busiest day of the primary election calendar.
Colorado was one of 16 states and one territory casting ballots on the pivotal primary day, when roughly one-third of the delegates needed to secure the presidential nomination were at stake.
After racking up a string of wins in early states, Biden and Trump entered the day poised to accumulate nearly enough delegates to secure their respective party’s nominations almost eight months before Election Day, potentially setting up a historic rematch between the current and former president. Haley, a former South Carolina governor and Trump’s sole remaining GOP rival, faced pressure to notch some wins or exit the race.
According to early, unofficial results, Trump was leading Haley in Colorado by nearly 30 percentage points, while Biden had received roughly 85% of the vote, with votes for “uncommitted delegate” appearing to be his closest competition.
Before Colorado polls closed at 7 p.m., Biden and Trump had notched wins in Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Maine, Alabama, Massachusetts and Oklahoma, according to AP. Biden, meanwhile, had won Vermont, while the state’s Republican primary appeared to be too close to call.
Just an hour later, Biden and Trump had been proclaimed the winners in four more states, including delegate-rich Texas, setting up a coast-to-coast sweep that effectively cemented their holds on the nominations.
A decision announced Monday by the U.S. Supreme Court removed a big question mark that had loomed over Colorado’s GOP primary by ruling that the state Supreme Court cannot disqualify Trump, which means votes for him will count. The high court’s unanimous decision overturned a December ruling by the Colorado Supreme Court that found Trump ineligible for the state’s primary ballot under a constitutional provision barring candidates who have engaged in an insurrection.
Minutes after results began posting, Colorado Democrats cheered Biden’s primary win in a state that hasn’t tilted toward the GOP presidential nominee in 20 years.
“Today, Colorado voters once again displayed that we are energized and ready to send President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris back to the White House,” said state Democratic chair Shad Murib in a statement.
“Thanks to President Biden, Space Command will continue to call Colorado Springs its home, thousands of jobs have been created in rural and metropolitan areas alike, and inflation is down,” Murib said.
“Donald Trump doesn’t just take credit for the failures of his administration — he’s promising to double down on overturning Roe v. Wade, putting his politics ahead of our national security, and doing even more harm to our public lands.”
Added Murib: “With so much at stake, Coloradans are ready to reject Donald Trump’s agenda once again and reelect President Biden and Vice President Harris this November.”
The head of the Colorado Republican Party, which broke with tradition to formally endorse Trump in January, celebrated the former president’s victory in a social media post.
“Congratulations to President #Trump for winning the Colorado Republican Primary vote!” said state GOP chairman Dave Williams on X. “It’s a ‘yuge’ victory for our GOP nominee.”
“Now we pivot to defeating crooked Joe Biden,” Williams added.
Haley, the only presidential candidate to campaign in Colorado ahead of this year’s primary, had hoped to score an upset in the state, counting on its disproportionately high share of voters with college degrees and the ability of unaffiliated voters to participate in either party’s primary after performing well with those groups in other primaries.
Through 3 p.m. Tuesday, county clerks reported receiving more than 1.25 million ballots from Colorado voters, with votes in the Republican primary outpacing those cast in the Democratic primary. Of the ballots processed at that point, just over 650,000 were Republican primary ballots, and nearly 450,000 were cast in the Democratic primary, with about 150,000 still in process.
Unaffiliated voters, who could cast ballots in either major party’s primary, were returning about twice as many Republican ballots as Democratic ones.
Colorado voters were faced with crowded ballots in both parties, though most of the listed Republicans had suspended their campaigns by the time the state’s 3.8 million active, registered voters began receiving mail ballots in mid-February.
In addition to Trump and Haley, the state’s GOP primary ballot included Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Ohio entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson and Texas businessman Ryan Binkely, who ended their campaigns after voting began in Iowa and New Hampshire.
Biden shared the Democratic ballot with Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips and self-help author Marianne Williamson, along with several candidates who lack national profiles and haven’t mounted active campaigns: Jason Michael Palmer, Gabriel Cornejo, Frankie Lozada, Stephen Lyons and Armando “Mando” Perez-Serrato.
But a new line this year in the party’s primary drew more attention than any of Biden’s opponents, as Colorado Democrats had the option of voting for “noncommitted delegate,” which some progressive groups touted as a way to register a protest vote against Biden and his administration’s handling of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.
While the equivalent option received enough votes a week earlier in Michigan to send a pair of uncommitted delegates from the state to this summer’s Democratic National Convention, “uncommitted delegate” didn’t appear to be on track to earn any Colorado delegates.
Roughly an hour after polls closed, as votes trickled in, the option had only garnered about 7% of the vote, less than half the 15% threshold required to win any delegates.
Haley, however, was poised to emerge from Colorado with as many as one-third of the state’s delegates bound for the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee in mid-July.
Both parties begin selecting national delegates this week in precinct caucuses, which have been scheduled through Saturday by county parties. Convention delegate slates are set to be finalized at the party’s congressional district and state assemblies in April.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Pictured from left are President Joe Biden, former President Donald Trump and Republican presidential candidate former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley. As Colorado voters cast ballots on Super Tuesday, March 5, 2024, Biden and Trump are on the brink of winning their party’s presidential nominations, setting up a rematch that many voters sthey would rather not endure, as Haley is under pressure to post some wins or exit the race.
