A4 eZ M2 THE WASHINGTON POST.THURSDAy, MARCH 5 , 2020
election 2020
BY ANNIE LINSKEY
AND SEAN SULLIVANdetroit — Top surrogates and
allies of Sens. Elizabeth Warren
and B ernie S anders are discussing
ways for their two camps to unite
and push a common liberal agen-
da, with the expectation that War-
ren is likely to leave the presiden-
tial campaign soon, according to
two people familiar with the t alks.
The conversations, which are in
an early phase, largely involve
members of Congress who back
Sanders (I-Vt.) reaching out to
those in Warren’s camp to explore
the prospect that Warren (D-
mass.) might endorse him. They
are also appealing to Warren’s s up-
porters to switch their allegiance
to Sanders, according two people
with direct knowledge of the con-
versations who spoke on the con-
dition o f anonymity to discuss d el-
icate discussions that are sup-
posed to b e confidential.
Warren associates and the
camp of former vice president Joe
Biden also had talks about a po-
tential endorsement if she drops
out, according to two people fa-
miliar with the conversations.
The whirlwind of activity re-
flects the rapid changes in a Dem-
ocratic primary that is still very
much in transition. As l ate as Tues-
day, many Warren allies believed
she w ould stay i n the race until the
Democratic convention, despite
her poor showing to date in the
primaries, in hopes of retaining
her clout and influencing the
eventual n ominee.
But a fter Warren’s b leak p erfor-
mance in the Super Tuesday pri-
maries, her associates, as well as
those of Sanders and Biden, say
she i s now l ooking f or the b est way
to step aside. T here is no certainty
she will endorse Sanders or any-
one else, but the talks reflect the
growing pressure on the senator
from massachusetts to withdraw.
Warren campaign manager
roger Lau suggested Wednesday
she was considering that. “Last
night, we f ell well short of viability
goals and projections, and we are
disappointed in the results,” he
wrote to campaign staffers in a
note obtained by The Washington
Post. “We are going to announce
shortly that Elizabeth is talking to
the team to assess the path for-
ward.”
Warren and Sanders spoke by
phone Wednesday, Sanders told
reporters in Vermont. “She h as not
made any decisions as of this
point,” h e said. “It is important for
all of us, certainly me, who has
known Elizabeth Warren for
many, many years, to respect the
time and the space she needs to
make a decision.”“She has run a strong cam-
paign,” Sanders said. “She will
make h er o wn decision i n her o wn
time.”
Liberal groups that endorsed
Sanders are now planning a con-
ference call for Thursday, in part
to discuss the impact of Warren’s
candidacy on the race and the
potential effect o f a withdrawal.
Winning the backing of War-
ren, who began the r ace as a leader
of the party’s l iberal w ing but later
positioned herself as a uniter,
would b e a coup for e ither Sanders
or Biden. for Sanders, it could
help unify the liberal faction and
signal that he is very much still in
the race; for Biden, it would ex-
tend the recent rush of party lead-
ers w ho have rallied around him.Warren’s status is a major wild
card in a primary that appears to
be settling into a protracted battle
between Biden and Sanders. oth-
er candidates with no clear path to
the n omination h ave dropped out,
but her aides say privately they
had hoped Warren would stay in
until the next Democratic debate,
on march 15.
Warren may be the only female
candidate to qualify for that de-
bate, and her departure would
leave Democrats essentially decid-
ing between two white men in
their late 70s — after the party’s
last two presidential nominees
were a black man and a white
woman.
Her debate skills have been a
high point of h er c ampaign, show-casing her mastery of policy and
her intellectual deftness — partic-
ularly in the Las Vegas debate,
when she verbally disassembled
former New York mayor mike
Bloomberg, arguably ending his
campaign.
And despite a string of disap-
pointing finishes in the early pri-
mary states, Warren continued to
draw thousands to her rallies, in-
cluding recent events in Seattle,
Denver, Houston and Detroit.
money, too, has continued to
flow. Her campaign raised
$29 million in february, com-
pared with Biden’s $18 million
haul for that month. Warren also
has the support of a super PAC
that’s been airing $14 million
worth of TV a ds f or her.But Tuesday’s results, which
were far worse than her campaign
had projected, may have changed
the equation. Early returns
showed her capturing 28 of the
1,338 delegates at stake, although
that could grow as California con-
tinues to tabulate its numbers.
She finished third in her home
state of massachusetts and fourth
in oklahoma, where she grew up.
She reached the 15 percent state-
wide threshold, which is neces-
sary to win s ignificant numbers of
delegates, in only five of the 14
states that v oted Tuesday.
on Tuesday, when Warren vot-
ed in her home precinct — at an
elementary school in Cambridge
— s tudents dropped red and w hite
rose petals f rom their second-floor
window as she walked by. They
pressed against windows to catch
a glimpse of her, and she waved at
them after v oting.
But Warren h as also b een facing
mounting pressure from liberal
activists and Sanders supporters
to depart the race. They a rgue that
she is hurting the senator from
Vermont by dividing the party’s
liberal faction, while Democratic
centrists have coalesced behind
Biden. Sanders also fell below ex-
pectations Tuesday, as Biden
rolled up b ig margins.
rep. Ilhan omar (D-minn.), a
Sanders backer and leading voice
on the left, said via Twitter: “Imag-
ine if the progressives consolidat-
ed last night like the moderates
consolidated, who would have
won?”
other left-leaning groups have
been pressuring her for weeks to
depart.
“She should drop out of t he race
and endorse Bernie Sanders,” said
matt Bruenig, founder of the Peo-
ple’s Policy Project, a liberal think
tank, whose group has been push-
ing for her exit since her fourth-
place f inish i n New Hampshire.
“The question is how to get her
to prioritize that this [a progres-
sive agenda] is a more important
thing than w hatever it is she h opes
to achieve by staying in,” Bruenig
said.
ann [email protected]
[email protected]sullivan reported from Burlington, Vt.Warren, Sanders allies scramble to find her an exit ramp
MAtt McclAIn/tHe WAsHIngton Post
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-mass.) speaks in Detroit on Super Tuesday, when her poor results surprised her campaign. Winning Warren’s
support would be a victory for either of her primary opponents, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) or former vice president Joe Biden.As candidate considers
bowing out, opponents
seek her backingoverall lead of about 45 delegates.
Perhaps more important, he was
able to build a powerful coalition
that included African American
voters and the white working
class, winning over women in the
suburbs and disaffected republi-
cans.
Turnout was up sharply in
many of the states, with nearly
every one voting in bigger num-
bers than in 2016 and some states
exceeding the 2008 contest that
has been the modern barometer
for voter enthusiasm.
In Texas, turnout was up about
60 percent compared with 2016,
while Te nnessee saw a 37 percent
increase.
About 1.3 million voters in
Virginia cast ballots in the Demo-
cratic primary, up from the previ-
ous record of about 986,000 dur-
ing the 2008 contest.
There are still significant risks
for Biden, and he will test wheth-
er voters care about his verbal
gaffes or whether republican at-
tempts to re-litigate the actions of
his son Hunter will gain addition-
al traction. Biden’s son served on
the board of Burisma, a Ukraini-
an gas company, w hile he was vice
president and attempting to
crack down on corruption in
Ukraine. While there has been no
evidence of wrongdoing, the ac-
tions of the Bidens became a part
of Trump’s impeachment trial.
Biden’s campaign — and his
growing list of prominent endors-
ers — has increasingly tried to
showcase his character and em-
pathy.
They say that making the con-
trast between a longtime politi-
cian who even opponents say is a
good and decent person will pro-
vide a strong contrast with
Trump, who has stretched tradi-
tional limits of civility and dis-
course.
“We set high expectations for
the campaign [on Tuesday], and
he absolutely blew through those
expectations and had a record-
breaking night,” said rep. Cedric
L. richmond (D-La.), co-chair-
man of the Biden campaign. “Peo-
ple know Joe Biden. He’s authen-
tic. He has empathy. He’s con-
cerned, and he has experience.”
[email protected]
[email protected]Annie linskey, Michael scherer and
sean sullivan contributed to this
report.ing his staff as part of a separate
independent group to help Biden,
according to campaign finance
experts.
Biden is not the only Democrat
in the party eager for Bloomberg
to stay invested.
Senate minority Leader
Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), who
benefited in 2018 from a $20 mil-
lion donation Bloomberg gave to
an outside group supporting Sen-
ate Democrats, released a state-
ment after Bloomberg left the
race.
“mayor michael Bloomberg’s
deep and impactful record of
action on gun safety, fighting
climate change, and advocating
for immigration reform made
him a strong and worthy compet-
itor in this primary,” Schumer
said. “His continuing commit-
ment to these fights — and to
defeating the divisive and damag-
ing Trump presidency — is states-
manlike and will permanently
inure to his credit.”
There are six states voting on
Tuesday, awarding 352 delegates.
The largest prize is michigan, but
missouri and Washington state
also have large hauls. Biden is
poised to do well in mississippi,
which has the same demograph-
ics as the Southern states he
swept on Tuesday.
Perhaps the only major mo-
ment to change the race comes
during a march 15 debate in
Phoenix. Two days later, four im-
portant bellwether states — Ari-
zona, florida, Illinois and ohio —
vote and award 577 delegates, the
second-biggest single-day haul
remaining in the race.
By the end of march, nearly
two-thirds of the delegates will
have been awarded, and pressure
will grow on any candidate who
doesn’t have a chance at reaching
a majority to drop out of the race.
It takes 1,991 delegates to win the
nomination.Biden’s Texas upset
Biden carried 10 of 14 Super
Tuesday states. He swept the
South and won in the Upper
midwest, carried massachusetts
and maine, and scored a major
upset by winning Te xas.
Sanders won his home state of
Vermont, as well as Colorado and
Utah, and was expected to win
the biggest delegate prize of Cali-
fornia.
most tallies had Biden with an“entered the race for president to
defeat Donald Trump, and today I
am leaving the race for the same
reason.”
Bloomberg has pledged to em-
ploy large field staffs in six swing
states in the general election,
even though he is no longer a
candidate. The billionaire’s data
operation, Hawkfish, will also
continue operating to elect Dem-
ocrats up and down the ballot.
“mike fully intends to put his
resources and commitment in the
broadest way possible behind Joe
Biden’s candidacy,” said Tim
o’Brien, a senior adviser to
Bloomberg. “We have long-term
leases and long-term contracts
with the team, and the intention
was always to put this big ma-
chine we have built behind who-
ever the nominee is.”
Bloomberg’s aides, however,
have not announced whether
they will take out ads in the
primary campaign to help Biden
or whether Bloomberg campaign
staffers in upcoming primary
states will work for Biden’s nomi-
nation.
Campaign finance rules gener-
ally give self-funded campaigns
significant leeway to spend mon-
ey, even if the funds support other
candidates. Bloomberg also has
the option of renaming or rehir-next move. “This decision is in
her hands, and it’s i mportant that
she has the time and space to
consider what comes next,” Lau
wrote.
Warren and Sanders spoke by
phone Wednesday. Their top sur-
rogates and allies have discussed
ways for them to unite a nd push a
common liberal agenda, The Post
reported Wednesday.
Aside from Warren, rep. Tulsi
Gabbard (D-Hawaii), who has
earned a single delegate from
American Samoa, is the only oth-
er candidate remaining.Bloomberg’s strange ride
Bloomberg’s exit from the race
concluded one of the most unusu-
al campaigns in politics, in which
a billionaire tested the limits of
money’s impact on the first stages
of a highly volatile presidential
primary race.
But after dismal results — p ick-
ing up delegates but failing to win
a single state outright — the
former mayor on Wednesday
morning called Biden to discuss
his decision.
“I’m sorry we didn’t win. It’s
still the best day of my life, and
tomorrow’s going to be even bet-
ter,” Bloomberg said to cheers
from a crowd later in the day in
New York. He reiterated that heJoe and I are running very differ-
ent campaigns, and my h ope is, in
the coming months, we’ll be able
to debate and discuss the very
significant differences that we
have.”
Sanders, who has been criti-
cized for the bullying and vitriol
that some of his supporters em-
ploy on social media, also reiter-
ated that he does not want the
campaign to turn into a “Trump-
type effort where we’re attacking
each other, where it’s personal
attacks — that’s the last thing this
country wants.”
Sanders and Warren spoke ear-
lier on Wednesday, and she told
him that she is assessing her
campaign’s future.
roger Lau, Warren’s campaign
manager, sent an all-staff email
Wednesday morning thanking
them and explaining that the
candidate will make a decision
about her future in coming days.
“Last night, we fell well short of
viability goals and projections,
and we are disappointed in the
results,” L au wrote, according to a
copy of the email obtained by The
Washington Post. “We are going
to announce shortly that Eliza-
beth is talking to the team to
assess the path forward.”
He also asked that Warren be
given some time to figure out herdiverse field — powered by a
half-dozen women attempting to
tap into an activated female elec-
torate — has now boiled down to
two white men in their late 70s
who each have spent about a
half-century running for political
office.
Biden and Sanders are now
preparing to catapult their candi-
dacies into a new round of con-
tests over the next two Tuesdays,
when 10 more states will vote and
award nearly 900 additional dele-
gates, a stretch that could deter-
mine the race.
As the results from the states
that voted on Super Tuesday be-
came more definitive, the shape
of the campaign shifted swiftly
and forcefully. Sanders cruised
into Super Tuesday hoping to
surge to a potentially insur-
mountable lead. But now, Biden
is narrowly ahead — and looking
at a more favorable map as demo-
graphics in the upcoming con-
tests largely tilt in his direction.
Biden has 433 delegates to Sand-
ers’s 388, with California still
tallying results.
Voter turnout in several states
was dramatically higher than in
2016, with Democratic voters mo-
tivated to choose a nominee who
they hope can unseat President
Trump. But Sanders, whose cam-
paign has long argued that it was
expanding the electorate with
new, younger voters, conceded
that had not happened.
“Have we been as successful as
I would hope in bringing young
people in?” Sanders said to re-
porters at a campaign office in
Burlington, Vt. “ The answer is
no.”
Sanders for months has had
trouble taking a sharp line
against Biden, jabbing occasion-
ally at him as if they were in a
fight on the Senate floor rather
than a brawl for the Democratic
nomination. But the future of his
candidacy may depend on wheth-
er he can trigger a seismic shift in
how voters view the former vice
president.
“Joe Biden is someone I’ve
known for many years. I like Joe, I
think he is a very decent human
being,” Sanders told reporters
Wednesday. “Joe and I, we have a
very different voting record. Joe
and I have a very different vision
for the future of this country, and
CampaIgn from a
Bloomberg prepares to shift his money and sta≠ in support of Biden’s campaign
tonI l. sAndys/tHe WAsHIngton Post
mike Bloomberg waves at his Super Tuesday rally in Florida. He has pledged large staffs in swing states
for the general election, and his data operation will keep helping Democrats up and down the ballot.