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March 5, 2024, will be a ‘Super Tuesday’ in the ongoing cycle of the US Presidential elections, scheduled for November. On this day, supporters of the Democratic and Republican candidates in 15 states will vote for their preferred party candidate in the presidential race.
The Associated Press described it as “the biggest day on the election calendar”, while other commentators noted that its significance is somewhat dulled this year. Here is what happens on the day, why it matters for the rest of the elections, and what to expect this year.
To understand where Super Tuesday fits in the US elections, here is a quick look at the larger process.
American voters usually have a strong affiliation with either of the two major political parties. As part of the Presidential elections, they first vote in the primary and caucus polls, or in a third setup that is a combination of the two. In some of these, only registered Democrats or Republicans can vote, instead of general voters.
As previously explained, “In primaries, voters go to polling stations and check the box against the name of their favoured candidate.” For example, Republican voters will have Donald Trump and Nikki Haley as their options, since other candidates have dropped out of the race.
In comparison, caucuses are lengthier. Voters attend meetings at public places such as school gymnasiums, churches, and community centres, debate candidate preferences and openly raise their hands for their choice of vote.
For candidates, winning a primary or caucus means winning the support of the several “delegates” that are assigned to each state. Delegates are the parties’ members or local supporters of a candidate.
At this stage, delegates matter because it is they who later vote to select the party nominee at the Democratic and Republican National Conventions held in the summer.
During the conventions, the two parties announce their official candidate for the Presidential polls following a vote among their delegates. The delegates essentially confirm the candidate who has been winning the most primaries and caucuses so far in the process.
If no candidate gets the majority of a party’s delegates during the primaries and caucuses, convention delegates vote to choose the nominee.
Delegates are seen as representing the party’s will, although some have criticised the process for not letting voters directly choose their candidate.
There is also a category of so-called “superdelegates” – meaning party seniors, former Presidents, etc. – who do not have to vote for the candidate who has won the earlier polls. They are thus “unpledged”, meaning they can choose who they want to and potentially sway the party decision.
As reported earlier, “In the Democratic party, the proportion of votes in a state (or in districts) determines the number of delegates. Some states in the Republican primary are winner-takes-all, giving all the delegates in a state to the winning candidate.”
This year, the states will hold their primaries and caucuses from January to June. In March or sometimes in February, one Tuesday sees multiple states going to polls the same day.
March 5 will see polls in 15 states – Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont and Virginia.
Further, Democrats in the US territory of American Samoa will have the caucus elections, while Democrats in Iowa will release the results of their earlier presidential preference caucus.
The results of a Super Tuesday have, over the years, been seen as strongly indicating the candidate who will be eventually chosen as the party nominee.
According to The New York Times, the concept has been spoken about since at least the 1970s. In the 1988 elections cycle, Democrats in about a dozen southern states (which traditionally vote for Republicans), attempted to shift their votes to have a greater say in the election process. In total, 20 states saw voting on that year’s Super Tuesday.
Pew Research noted, “They believed that if their states held their nominating contests on the same day, relatively early in the cycle, they could boost the chances that someone from the region – or at least someone perceived as being moderate enough to do well there in November – would get the nomination.”
No surprises are likely this year. From the Democratic Party, US President Joe Biden is seeking re-election and he does not have significant challengers.
From the Republican party, a crowded field that initially included the likes of Florida governor Ron DeSantis and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy has now thinned to Trump and Haley. Winning the Washington primary on Sunday (March 3), Haley became the first Republican woman to have won a primary in the long history of US elections.
But that is the only victory she has lodged so far, in the face of significant support for Trump among Republican voters. As the AP reported, “As Tuesday’s contests near, Biden and Trump appear on their way to securing their parties’ nominations even though just eight states will have awarded delegates through presidential primaries or party caucuses by then.”
