Political Rewind: Last Minute Drop-Outs, Endorsements Shake Up Super Tuesday

Caption

Elliott Zaagman from Michigan put wears his mask after casting vote on the Super Tuesday, for U.S. Democrats Abroad multi-location global primary at Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand, Tuesday, March 3, 2020. / AP

Tuesday on Political Rewind, Gov. Brian Kemp joined us at the beginning of our show to discuss the latest updates on the coronavirus in Georgia.

Afterward, the Democratic presidential primary stretches across the country today, as voters in 14 states participate in Super Tuesday.

On the eve of the voting, Joe Biden received a boost from three former opponents. Amy Klobuchar, Pete Buttigieg and Beto O’Rourke officially announced their endorsements of Biden Monday night.

And, after a full day of early voting here in Georgia, poll workers and voters say there were few issues with casting ballots on the state’s new machines.

Panelists:

Buddy Darden — Former Democratic Congressman

Pearl Dowe — Asa Griggs Candler Professor of Political Science and African American Studies, Emory University

Tamar Hallerman — Senior Reporter, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Rusty Paul — Mayor of Sandy Springs

Transcript Highlights:

This conversation has been edited for conciseness and clarity. 

Timecode: [00:30:07]

Buddy Darden: I am totally mystified by the fact that the young people, the youngest group of voters, seem to rally around the oldest candidate that we have.

Bill Nigut: Well, free college, Medicare for all. I mean, he has a platform that I can understand younger people being attracted to. Of course, enacting that legislation, Rusty Paul… is a different matter.

Rusty Paul: It is. But, you know, there's a deeper story going on here that doesn't get reported so much.

The Republicans went through it with Donald Trump. The Republican Party is no longer the party of pragmatic conservatism that you saw in Ronald Reagan and Jack Kemp and William F. Buckley all the way back to Edmund Burke. The Republican Party today is a populist party. It's William Jennings Bryan, updated to the 21st century.

You've got the same thing going on in the Democratic Party. You've got this fight over a new direction. The Democratic Party has historically been a blue-collar party working for the working-class folks. It was about jobs in construction and public works. Part of the party is struggling to hold on, and Bernie's taking them in a whole new direction.

A different kind of populism is occurring. And this is no longer the party of Franklin Roosevelt, John Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, or in some respects, even Barack Obama. You've got radical changes going on in both parties, and we're not sure how it's all going to end up.

Tamar Hallerman: And that's the argument that you hear from Bernie Sanders, folks, is that he is the person who is uniquely positioned in this very tumultuous moment in American politics to go toe-to-toe with somebody as non-traditional as Donald Trump.