What to expect from Biden and Trump in Georgia presidential primary

After nearly sweeping the Super Tuesday race, President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump are heading to Georgia, where they will campaign for votes in Tuesday’s presidential primary in a state that will decide their November fate. play a key role in the process.

The day could take on extra significance for Trump, as voters in Georgia and three other states could grant him enough delegates to clinch the Republican presidential nomination. Biden’s first possible victory date has also been moved up to March 12.

Beyond that, Georgia’s presidential primary will be largely anticlimactic. Trump’s main rival for the Republican nomination, former United Nations ambassador Nikki Haley, suspended her campaign this week after a drubbing on Super Tuesday, when she won the Vermont primary but lost. Dropped 14 other games. Biden will also face fewer challengers in the primary after U.S. Rep. Dean Phillips of Minnesota ends his campaign, although neither Phillips nor self-help author Marianne Williamson has so far commented on the event. The campaign’s primary and caucus vote totals have too much of an impact.

Biden will hold a campaign event in Atlanta on Saturday, while Trump will hold a rally about 70 miles (112 kilometers) away in Rome, northwest Georgia. It was the second time in a little more than a week that the two men had dueling events in a state with an upcoming primary election, while also eyeing the upcoming general election campaign. On February 29, Biden and Trump held an immigration-themed event along the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas on the eve of the Texas presidential primary.

Georgia is likely to play a key role in the general election again as it did in 2020, when Biden became the first Democratic presidential candidate to win the state since Bill Clinton in 1992. Biden narrowly beat Trump in Georgia by less than a quarter of a percentage point, leading by 11,779 votes. Trump’s efforts to overturn those results are at the center of an ongoing criminal case in Fulton County, even as a judge is considering a motion to remove District Attorney Fani Willis from the case.

Trump’s conduct in Georgia and other battleground states also played a role in the federal indictment of his attempts to cling to power after his 2020 election defeat, but that case has been put on hold as the Supreme Court prepares to consider Trump’s defense team argument that the former president is immune from prosecution.

Georgia holds the largest delegate prize and is the only swing state in Tuesday’s race. Super Tuesday puts both Biden and Trump on the brink of securing enough delegates to win their respective parties’ presidential nominations. Tuesday was the earliest time the milestone could be reached.

The Associated Press on Friday assigned delegates to Biden in Delaware and Florida, as both states canceled their Democratic presidential primaries and assigned all delegates to the sitting president. With this allocation, Biden’s first possible victory date would be pushed back to March 12, when he would only need to win 40% of available delegates to achieve that goal.

Here’s what to expect on election night:

primary school day

Georgia’s presidential primary is Tuesday. Voting closes at 7pm ET.

what’s on the ballot

The Associated Press will cover both the Democratic and Republican presidential primaries. The candidates listed on the Democratic ballot are Biden, Phillips and Williamson. In addition to Trump and Haley, the Republican ballot will list Florida businessman David Stackelberg and former candidates Ryan Binkley, Doug Burgum, Chris Christie, Ron DeSantis, Asa Hutchinson, Perry Johnson, Vivek Ramaswamy and Tim Scott.

Who can vote

Any registered voter can participate in either primary election. Voters in Georgia are not registered by party.

Representative assignment rules

Georgia has 108 sworn elected Democratic representatives, who are awarded under the national party’s standard rules. There are 23 at-large representatives distributed in proportion to the statewide vote, and 14 PLEO representatives (i.e., “party leaders and elected officials”). The state’s 14 congressional districts have a total of 71 representatives, who are allocated proportionally based on the vote results in each district. Candidates must receive at least 15% of the statewide vote to qualify for statewide delegates, and must receive at least 15% of the congressional district votes to qualify for that district’s delegates.

Georgia has 59 Republican delegates running in the primary. The 14 at-large delegates will be awarded proportionally to the candidate who receives at least 20 percent of the statewide vote. A total of 42 representatives from 14 congressional districts are at risk, three representatives from each district. The candidate who wins the majority of votes in a district will win three representatives from that district. If no candidate wins a majority of the vote in a district, the top vote-getter wins two delegates and the second-place finisher wins one delegate. The state’s three RNC members, the state chairman and the men and women of the RNC will be among the statewide winners.

Decision statement

Unlike the general election, Tuesday’s Georgia primary is unlikely to be competitive as Biden and Trump face no significant opposition in their re-election bids. Initial signs of statewide victory for Biden and Trump in both races are consistent with landslides in most other races held so far this year and may be enough to determine a statewide winner.

What does turnout and early voting look like?

Turnout for the 2022 Democratic primaries for U.S. Senate and Governor was approximately 11% of registered voters. The support rate for the US Republican Senate primary is 17%, and the support rate for the gubernatorial primary is 18%. As of February 13, there were nearly 8 million registered voters in Georgia.

As of Thursday, nearly 359,000 votes had been cast ahead of Election Day, with about 66% in the Republican primary and about 34% in the Democratic primary. In 2022, pre-Election Day votes accounted for approximately 51% of the total votes cast in the U.S. Democratic Senate primary and 41% in the Republican gubernatorial primary.

Are we there yet?

As of Tuesday, there are 125 days until the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, 160 days until the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, and 238 days until the November election.