2020 Democratic candidate Joe Biden hasn’t been spending as much time in the Super Tuesday states as one would expect ahead of the critical batch of primaries next week, and it could cost him.
A grim new report from the New York Times details the Biden campaign’s dangerously feeble ground game as Super Tuesday looms ever closer, which is perhaps best illustrated by the Times’ observation of the campaign’s padlocked office in Los Angeles–the only office Biden has in the delegate-rich state of California.
Compare that scene to the 23 offices of primary frontrunner Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), who is expected to win big in the state and others next week, and a troubling picture of Biden’s lack of effort mere days before the crucial contests begins to emerge.
In Texas, which holds the second largest trove of delegates after California, Biden’s campaign hasn’t been knocking on nearly as many doors as the other campaigns.
“I haven’t seen anything other than the events he’s had in Texas,” Gilberto Hinojosa, chair of the Lone Star state’s Democratic Party, said in an interview with the Times.
The Biden campaign’s outreach in other Southern states has been similarly light, according to local party leaders.
One issue concerning Biden’s Super Tuesday strategy could be a lack of money to compete across the dozen-plus states. The Biden campaign on Wednesday announced a six-figure ad buy in southern states, according to Politico, but Biden is being outspent by his rivals.
Read the NYT’s full report here.
As the saying goes, when you are up to your ass in alligators it is hard to remember that your primary mission was to drain the swamp. If Biden does not survive S. Carolina, nothing he does in the Super Tuesday states matters. Since he has limited resources, it makes sense for Biden to focus his attention on S. Carolina. I suspect that if he does well enough (e.g., excels) in S. CArolina that the funding floodgates will open. For his sake (and ours) I hope he is not too late.
Totally unexpectedly, V.P. Biden has become the Obi Wan Kenobi of the current election cycle!
Well, this seems like an egg and chicken thing. Without winning races, there’s no money and no groundgame, but with no groundgame, donors don’t have the confidence to invest.
Agreed…and before the expected deluge of Bernie-bots, let’s just say that I have been around Civil Rights leaders since the 1960s…have spoken with them and understand that voting for many of the people Biden is counting on takes on a special significance, given the fact that, in places like SC, many of the people Joe is counting on have deep feelings about things that others not in their position do not.**
That’s why Jim Clyburn’s short talk (shown on O’Donnell’s show last night), which was quite emotional for me, regarding Biden was worth a dozen focus groups and “outreach efforts” in a state like SC.
** Mayor Pete, for example, made some dismissive remarks about 1960s protests, which, for a lot of African Americans I was in college with, would settle the Mayor Pete Question once and for all: clueless w/r/t POC. (O’Donnell pointed out Pete’s cluelessness as well)
It’s hard not to read this and think that he’s repeating the same basic mistake as Hillary did in 2008–the electoral equivalent of being born on 3rd base and thinking he’s hit a triple.
You’d think, given how this thing has gone even before the primaries, that he’d have woken up to how things are shaping up. Far be it from me to give Trump credit for anything, but his nickname “Sleepy Joe” might be accurate, after all.