4 ★ FINANCIAL TIMES Tuesday10 March 2020
J O H N B U R N - M U R D O C H , A L A N S M I T H ,
C A L E T I L F O R D A N D JA N E P O N G
Presidential candidate Joe Biden’s sur-
prise weep of Super Tuesday primarys
contests was driven by voters who only
decided on their preferred candidate in
the US Democratic race in the week
before, an FT analysis of exit polls from
the March 3 votes suggest.
While his main rival Bernie Sanders’
supporters are steadfast — many made
up their mind they would vote for him
well before February’s primaries —
there’s little evidence that he is attract-
ing new voters in significant numbers.
This lack of momentum may prove
decisive in scuttling his campaign.
As other moderate candidates
dropped out of the race, some 19 per
cent of moderate voters were up for
grabs in the final days before Super
Tuesday. Mr Biden succeeded in getting
many to cast their primary ballots for
him.
The late surge of votes for Mr Biden
was apparent across all 14 states voting
in last week’s primaries, including Mr
Sanders’ home state of Vermont.
Although Mr Sanders won the state,
among voters who only decided in the
last week Mr Biden beathis rival.
The analysis suggests theSouth Caro-
lina primary n 29 February, which theo
former vice-president won, was pivotal
in providing the fresh appeal to voters
across the country, reviving the previ-
ously stuttering Biden campaign.
Mr Biden’s Super Tuesday resurgence
is reminiscent of the boost that pro-
pelled former president Barack Obama
to victory ahead of Hillary Clinton in- Mr Obama received an initial
9-point boost in his polling after win-
ning the opening Iowa caucuses. Like
Mr Biden, he then won South Carolina
ahead of a strong showing on Super
Tuesday, allowing him to overtake the
early frontrunner.
The exit polls from Super Tuesday’s
primaries also show Mr Sanders has
remained most popular with younger
voters and those who had not voted
before, while Mr Biden appealed to
older voters.
Mr Sanders has maintained his sup-
port from Hispanic and Asian voters,
while Mr Biden’s support among black
voters was equally apparent. However,
the impact of Mr Sanders’ core voter
base was reduced by low turnout among
young people.
The 65-plus age group that heavily
favoured Mr Biden over Mr Sanders
makes up only 19 per cent of the Super
Tuesday electorate, but accounted for
44 per cent of votes cast.
Mr Biden has also benefited from thewithdrawal of other moderate candi-
dates, freeing up moderate votes.
Ahead of the South Carolina primary,
supporters of Pete Buttigieg and Amy
Klobuchar said they were more likely to
vote for Mr Sanders than Mr Biden if
their candidate dropped out. After Mr
Biden’s emphatic victory on 29 Febru-
ary, however, both candidates left the
race andendorsed r Biden.M
Among Super Tuesday voters who
decided who to vote for in February, 15
per cent opted for either Mr Buttigieg or
Ms Klobuchar, but among those who
decided in the final days leading up to
the vote, only 4 per cent stuck with the
pair.
Former New York City mayor Michael
Bloomberg wasthe wild cardin the
democratic race. Following the billion-
aire’s poor performance on the debate
stage on 19 February, however, his share
of the Super Tuesday vote declined from
20 per cent among early deciders to 12
per cent among late movers.
Mr Sanders now needs to find a way of
quickly reversing the swing towards his
rival in what has become a two-horse
race — and endorsements may not helpclear the way for him. A post-Super
TuesdayReuters/Ipsos poll uggestss
that voters who previously supported
the progressive candidate Elizabeth
Warren are no more likely to turn to fel-
low progressive Mr Sanders than they
are to Mr Biden.
Instead, Mr Sanders will need greater
turnout from younger, Hispanic and
Asian voters than there was on Super
Tuesday. But demographic data for the
states in thenext round of democratic
primaries —Mississippi, North Dakota,
Michigan, Idaho, Missouri and Wash-
ington — suggest there will probably be
limited opportunities for this.
Hispanic voters make up no more
than 8 per cent of the citizen voting-age
population in this week’s primary
states.
There is still a long way to go in the
race to cross the threshold of 1,
pledged delegates needed to secure the
nomination at the Democratic Conven-
tion in July. But Mr Sanders has a long
battle ahead of him if he hopes to beat
the Biden campaign’s surge.
Notebook age 8p
Gideon Rachman age 9pI N T E R N AT I O N A L
SA M F L E M I N G , M I C H A E L P E E L A N D
J I M B R U N S D E N— BRUSSELS
L AU R A P I T E L— ANKARA
The EU wants a “future-proof” strategy
to prevent renewed escalations at its
border with Turkey, Ursula von der
Leyen said as senior officials from the
bloc and Nato prepared to meetRecep
Tayyip Erdogan in Brussels.
The European Commission president
saidevents at the Greek-Turkish border
pointed to “politically motivated pres-
sure” and that it was necessary to do
everything possible to ensure the situa-
tioncalmed down, and that reliable help
was provided for those at the frontier.
Asked about the prospect of a boost to
the EU’s €6bn 2016 agreement with
Turkey n refugees, she said talkso
between the parties would cover “all the
topics” and that the process was only
beginning. While some EU states,
including Germany, support discussions
on more money,many others rea
opposed, and several have accused Tur-
key of attempting to blackmail the EU.
Turkey is still formally in talks to join
the EU that began in 2005 but relations
between the two sides have been deteri-
orating for years.
Mr Erdogan was due in Brussels for
talks last night with Ms von der Leyen
and Charles Michel, the European
Council president, just over a week after
the Turkish president announced that
he had opened his frontiers with
Europe, leading to a flare-up on the bor-der with Greece. Thousands of refugees
and asylum seekers made their way to
Europe’s land and sea frontier, trigger-
ing alarm in European capitals even as
Athensprevented the majority of peo-
ple from crossing.On Friday, Europe’s foreign ministers
rebuffed Turkish demands for more
financial aid under the 2016 migration
deal struck after more than 1m people
arrived by Mediterranean routes in the
EU the previous year.
The Europeans are holding firm ontheir refusal to start giving ground to Mr
Erdogan, about more cash or visa liber-
alisation, under the threat of “black-
mail”.
Ms von der Leyen said yesterday that
Europe was caught on the horns of a
“deep dilemma”. There was an urgent
need to relieve the “tension and the
pressure” on the Greek-Turkish border,
she said.
Discussions with Mr Erdoganmarked
the resumption of dialogue between the
sides hat she hoped would lead to at
“road map” to a solution.
“On the one hand, we acknowledge
the fact that Turkey is doing a great deal,
is looking after millions of refugees, with
our help as well, but primarily Turkey is
looking after these millions of people,”
the commission president said.
“Secondly, we need to talk veryclearly about the fact that what hap-
pened last weekend cannot happen
again. We need a future-proof strategy
together to make sure these kinds of
escalations at the Greek-Turkish border
do not happen again.”
Turkey, which is home to 3.6m people
from Syria, argues that Europe has
failed to carry its share of the burden in
caring for refugees fleeing the Syrian
conflict.
It accuses the EU of being slow to pay
out the money promised under the 2016
deal and failing to uphold other com-
mitments in the agreement, including
visa-free travel for Turkish citizens to
Europe’s Schengen area.
Mr Erdogan also wants EU support for
Turkey’s plan to create a “safe zone” for
refugees in a swath of Turkish-control-
led territory in northern Syria.JA M I E S M Y T H— SYDNEYAustralia’s privacy watchdog is suing
Facebook ver its role in theo Cam-
bridge Analytica candal, whichs
involved harvesting the personal data
of tens of millions of people from the
social media platform for political
advertising purposes.The Office of the Australian Informa-
tion Commissioner saidyesterday that
it hadstarted egal proceedings in thel
Federal Court, alleging Facebook had
seriously and repeatedly contravened
privacy law by exposing users’ data to
Cambridge Analytica, a political
research firm.
“We claim these actions left the per-
sonal data of around 311,127 Australian
Facebook users to be sold and used for
purposes including political profiling,
well outside users’ expectations,” said
Angelene Falk, Australia’s information
and privacy commissioner.
The Australian case is the latest in a
series of legal challenges facing the US
social media group, which haspaid
more than $5bn in fines related to the
misuse of users’ data in the Cambridge
Analytica scandal.
Under existing laws, Australia’s Fed-
eral Court can impose a civil penalty of
up to A$1.7m ($1.1m) for each serious
and/or repeated interference with
privacy.
The scandal erupted in 2018 when the
UK’s Observer newspaper revealed that
Facebook user data were leaked to the
political research firm through a third-
party app, which enabled campaigns to
target individuals with ads.
Since the scandal, Facebook has faced
a barrage f criticism from regulatorso
and politicians in Europe, the US and
elsewhere, and accusations that the
company not only misused user data
but also allowed its platforms to be used
to spread disinformation.
The Australian lawsuit alleges the
personal information of users was dis-
closed to theThis is Your Digital Life ppa
for a purpose other than that for which
the information was collected, breach-
ing local privacy laws.
Facebook’s default settings facilitated
the disclosure of personal data, includ-
ing sensitive information, at the
expense of privacy, according to court
documents.
Ms Falk said most of the Australian
users did not install the app themselves
and their personal information was dis-
closed via their friends’ use of the app.
Facebook disclosed the personal infor-
mation of Australian users toThis is Your
Digital Life between March 2014
and May 2015 in breach of the 1988 Pri-
vacy Act.
“These were systematic failures to
comply with Australian privacy laws by
one of the world’s largest technology
companies,” said Ms Falk.
Facebook said it had engaged with the
privacy commissioner over a two-year
period as part of its investigation.
“We’ve made major changes to our
platforms, in consultation with interna-
tional regulators to restrict the informa-
tion available to app developers, imple-
ment new governance protocols and
build industry-leading controls to help
people protect and manage their data,”
the company said.
“We’re unable to comment further as
this is now before the Federal Court.”SA M F L E M I N G A N D P E G GY H O L L I N G E R
PARIS
Europe will this week announce plans
for a new EU-wide partnership to
develop cleanhydrogen fuel technolo-
gies, as Brussels seeks ways to acceler-
ate its push towards carbon neutrality.
Plans for a “clean hydrogen” alliance
will be unveiledtoday alongside a new
industrial strategy for Europe, officials
said, following the precedent set by last
year’s advanced battery technology alli-
ance, which was cleared to receive
€3.2bn in public support.
An EU official saidclean hydrogen
could become vital for energy heavy
sectors such as aviation, transport and
other parts of heavy industry.
The alliance marks a more assertive
industrial approach from the EUamid
competition from Chinaand elsewhere,
with plans to deploy a range of tools,
including trade, competition and pro-
curement policies. Officials hope even-
tually to clear the hydrogen alliance for
state aid as the battery alliance was.
The alliance is one of a number of
projects cited in preliminary drafts of
the commission’s industrial strategy,
which is being spearheaded by Thierry
Breton, EU single market commis-
sioner, with other officials. He told the
Financial Times that hydrogen would be
a vital technology for European indus-
try in the years to come. “It will be stra-
tegically important for energy inde-pendence and the future of Europe,” he
said in an interview in Paris.
Interest in using hydrogen as a
replacement forfossil fuels s increasingi
globally as governments come under
pressure to impose strict constraints on
emissions. However, the technology to
produce the alternative fuel cleanly —
through electrolysis of water — remains
prohibitively expensive. The aviation
and automotive sectors have called for
government support to bring the tech-
n o l o gy i n t o t h e m a i n s t re a m.Some of Europe’s biggest industrial
groups are expected to meet this week
to discuss the shape and goals of an alli-
ance. Policymakers hope leading com-
panies such as Air Liquide of France and
Bosch of Germany will be interested.
The latest industrial strategy, t leasta
the fifth such initiative from Brussels
since 2005, comes as companies across
Europe push for a new approach in light
of huge technological change and
increasing geopolitical volatility.
Mr Breton said it would pave the way
for the creation of new industrial “eco-
systems” across Europe, which he
hoped would bolster companies’ per-
formance, including in green and digital
technologies. The plan is expected to
include key performance indicators for
these clusters, to track their progress
and the effectiveness of policy adjust-
ments.
“Our job is to establish a vision,” Mr
Breton said. “We need to provide a strat-
egy because we need to give visibility for
investment [in] the long term”.
Additional reporting by Mehreen Khan in
Brussels, David Keohane in Paris and Joe
Miller in FrankfurtRefugees
EU seeks ‘future-proof ’ deal with Erdogan
Brussels suspects border
clashes are ‘politically
motivated pressure’
Privacy scandal
Australia
watchdog
sues Facebook
over personal
data breach
Clean energy
Europe to unveil hydrogen fuel partnership
M E H R E E N K H A N A N D SA M F L E M I N G
BRUSSELSBrussels’ plan for a carbon border levy
on imports risks getting snarled up in
political resistance and compliance
that could radically reduce the scope of
the measure and delay it for years, offi-
cials have warned.As part of the EU’s push tobecome cli-
mate neutral by 2050, the European
Commission has promised a “carbon
border mechanism” that would impose
sanctions on foreign C02 imports to pro-
tect European industries from being
undercut by overseas polluters. The
idea is among the most radical elements
of commission president Ursula von der
Leyen’s “Green Deal” and has already
raised concern from the US and China
about European “protectionism”.
Officials have vowed to put forward a
proposal by next year. Frans Timmer-
mans, commissioner in charge of the
Green Deal, last week said the scheme
was designed to prevent “carbon leak-
age” — where activities and industry
could decamp from the EU to countries
with less onerous environmental stand-ards. “We will protect European indus-
try if it takes a historic step to decarbon-
ise,” he said.
But behind the promises, diplomats
and officials have warned the mecha-
nism is a uniquely complicated and
unprecedented exercise that has
already provoked resistance from pow-erful members including Germany. Ber-
lin has voiced fears a carbon tax would
intensify tit-for-tat trade retaliation
from the US targeting its car industry.
“We should take into account that
some jurisdictions, particularly the US,
are just waiting for a reason to slap tar-
iffs on EU products,” said Markus Fer-
ber, a German MEP. The border tax was
“the perfect pretext” to do that.
Among the questions is how the EU
can ensure the mechanism, which the
commission is no longer calling a “tax”,does not fall foul of World Trade Organi-
zation rules. Phil Hogan, EU trade com-
missioner, told the Financial Times last
month that if the measure was “not
WTO-compatible then we have to look
at an alternative way”.
Diplomats warn political resistance
will mean that even after a proposal is
put forward in 2021, member states and
MEPs could take years to agree on the
mechanism’s workings.
“This won’t see the light of day until
we are in the final years of this commis-
sion,” said one diplomat. Another offi-
cial said the EU was banking on never
having to use the tool if the US — should
Mr Trump lose this year’s presidential
election — falls back in line with interna-
tional climate targets.
Commission officials admit the scope
of the legislation is likely to be initially
limited to target areas such as cement
rather than more politically sensitive
imports, including steel. Other open
questions include how the scheme
would be governed and whether sanc-
tions would automatically apply to
countries that did not abide by the goals
of the Paris climate accord.Green drive
Brussels carbon border tax risks years of delay
Interest in using
hydrogen as a
replacement for
fossil fuels si
increasing
worldwide‘Some jurisdictions,
particularly the US, are
waiting for a reason to slaptariffs on EU products’
Democratic duel Biden’s late surge knocks Sanders’ hopes
Biden attracted previously undecided voters
Source: FT analysis of Edison Research exit polls FT graphicPer cent, by when voter decided who to vote for in
Super Tuesday primary on Mar Sanders’ strongest demographic did not turn out in force on Super Tuesday
Per cent of voters, all Super Tuesday primaries on Mar Width shows age group as a share of all voters Width shows race as a share of all votersSandersBidenWarrenOtherBloombergSandersBidenWarrenOtherBloomberg to to to and over
Asian Hispanic/
LatinoWhite BlackDecided before
FebruaryIn
FebruaryIn past
weekAll Super Tuesday primaries SandersBidenWarrenOtherBloombergCommission president
von der Leyen says Europe
is caught on the hornsof a ‘deep dilemma’
Joe Biden is the favoured candidate
among black and older votersMARCH 10 2020 Section:World Time: 9/3/2020- 18:04 User:john.conlon Page Name:WORLD3 USA, Part,Page,Edition:USA, 4, 1