THE WALL STREET JOURNAL. ** Wednesday, March 4, 2020 |A
some delegates. In some
states where Mr. Sanders won
or was leading, Mr.
Bloomberg’s vote share was
larger than the margin be-
tween Mr. Biden and Mr.
Sanders. Before the results
came in, Mr. Sheekey insistedMr. Bloomberg wasn’t playing
spoiler to Mr. Biden.
Mr. Bloomberg and Mr. Bi-
den both competed for sup-
port from moderate and black
voters, trying to tie them-
selves to former President
Obama in ads. Mr. Bloomberg
spent an estimated $40 mil-
lion on several versions of a
30-second spot, including oneOn TV, radio and
digital, the
billionaire spent
over $500 million.Maine voters cemented in
place a new state law that
eliminates nonmedical vaccine
exemptions for schoolchildren.
A ballot measure Tuesday
that would have rolled back
the law was voted down, the
Associated Press projected.
The vote means Maine will
join a handful of states, in-
cluding California and New
York, that are making it
harder to opt out of vaccine
requirements as part of their
efforts to restrain preventable
diseases like measles.
“Tonight, the health and
well-being of Maine children
prevailed,” Gov. Janet Mills, a
Democrat, said late Tuesday.
The Maine law also applies
to college students, nursery-
school teachers and health
workers. They will only be
able to seek medical exemp-
tions for vaccine requirements
when the law goes into effect
next year, and will no longer
be able to opt out for religious
and philosophical reasons.
Opponents of the new law
said they felt it infringed on
parents’ rights and wouldn’t
improve public health. They
gathered enough signatures
last year to put the referen-
dum on the ballot and framed
their campaign as a rejection
of big drug companies.
Vaccination is the most ef-
fective and easiest way to pre-
vent infectious-disease out-
breaks, according to
physicians and public-health
officials.
The most recent state data
show the vaccination-exemp-
tion rate among Maine kinder-
gartners reached 6.2% for the
2018-19 school year, the high-
est level in 10 years of track-
ing data.BYJONKAMPU.S. NEWS
“He is starting to pick up a lit-
tle steam here,” he said.
Andrew Morrison, 50, a res-
ident of Los Alamitos, Calif.,
who works in plastics manu-
facturing, voted for Massachu-
setts Sen. Elizabeth Warren,
though he said she wasn’t
likely to get the nomination.
“If she can pick up some Cali-
fornia delegates, it gives her
more power to become a
player later,” he said.
At the Community College of
Denver, Rebecca Turner, 26, an
eco-psychology major, voted
early for Mr. Sanders but wor-
ries that he may not fare well in
the general election.
“In a perfect world, Bernie
Sanders would be my presi-
dent,” she said. If he doesn’t get
the nomination, she said she
would vote for Mr. Biden. “Ber-
nie is the, ‘Oh I wish,’ and Biden
is the ‘That’ll probably do.’ ”
In Raleigh, roofer Larry Bos-
tic, 34, said he chose Mr. Biden
after watching last week’s
feisty debate in Charleston,
S.C. “That thing was fierce,” he
said. “Biden was the only one
up there maintaining profes-
sionalism. Everyone else was
throwing jabs. We don’t need
that right now.”
Mr. Bostic, who is African-
American, said Mr. Sanders’s
criminal-justice policies would
help some of his friends who
have made bad choices. But he
said he couldn’t get comfort-
able with his style.
“Imagine if you went to
work one day and somebody
asked you what you were do-
ing and you just went, ‘Rah
rah!’ ” he said, holding up his
arms and shaking his wrists.
“You got to leave your feelings
at the door a little bit.”
Lighting a cigarette, Mr.
Bostic looked at the ground
and said he had to admit that
he had considered not voting.
He said he had felt like his
vote for Mrs. Clinton in 2016
didn’t count when she won the
popular vote but Mr. Trump
won the White House.
“It feels hopeless to a lot of
Americans,” he said. “But the
idea of not doing anything and
having an opinion? If you’re
not going to vote, don’t com-
plain.”
—Elizabeth Findell in
Houston; Alejandro Lazo in
Modesto, Calif.; Ian Lovett in
Seal Beach, Calif.; and
Deborah Acosta in Denver
contributed to this article.RALEIGH, N.C.—Democratic
voters from here to California
said they struggled to choose
between pragmatism and pol-
icy on Tuesday, mirroring a
national debate over whether
sweeping political and eco-
nomic changes or moderation
were the keys to defeating
President Trump.
Freelance marketing con-
sultant Julie Cook, who had
considered Vermont Sen. Ber-
nie Sanders because of his
health-care plans, woke up
Tuesday planning to vote for
former Vice President Joe Bi-
den, but hours later bubbled in
former New York City Mayor
Michael Bloomberg.
Ms. Cook said she liked that
Mr. Bloomberg plans to spend
whatever it takes to win, not-
ing she has struggled to ex-
plain Mr. Trump’s verbose be-
havior to her 4- and 6-year-old
daughters.
Mr. Trump “is ridiculous,”
said Ms. Cook, 37 years old.
“It’s gotten to the point that I
can’t stand to look at him on
TV anymore.”
In Houston, onetime Hillary
Clinton-backer Julia Kibbel
voted for Mr. Sanders because
of her work with the uninsured
as a nurse practitioner in the
county health department.
“He seems to be consistent,
and he’s more” focused on social
services, said Ms. Kibbel, 40.
Mr. Biden enjoyed a boost in
the 72 hours before Super Tues-
day, scoring a blowout win in
South Carolina’s primary Satur-
day and then securing endorse-
ments from three opponents
who left the race—former
South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete
Buttigieg, Minnesota Sen. Amy
Klobuchar and former Texas
Rep. Beto O’Rourke.
Many voters said the recent
near-daily shifts in the Demo-
cratic field have made their
choices fluid.
In Modesto, Calif., semi-re-
tired ironworker Scott Szug-
gar, 54, said he was glad he
held on to his mail-in ballot
for a week.
“I kind of had a feeling that
people were going to drop out,”
he said, as he left his ballot at a
downtown voting center.
Mr. Szuggar said he had
been leaning toward Mr.
Bloomberg but cast his vote
for Mr. Biden because he
seemed to have momentum.
BYVALERIEBAUERLEIN
At Precincts, Voters Weigh a Stark Choice
Bloomberg Assesses Bid for Nomination
think most Democrats in this
race understand that our
number one objective is de-
feating Donald Trump, and
then all of us are supporting
a nominee.”
“As of right now we’re
committed to stay in, but
we’ll see what happens to-
day,” Mr. Sheekey said.
As early results showed
Mr. Biden sweeping states
where Mr. Bloomberg had
heavily invested, he ad-
dressed his supporters and
tried to project confidence.
“No matter how many del-
egates we win tonight, we
have done something no one
else thought was possible,”
Mr. Bloomberg said at his
election night event in West
Palm Beach, Fla. “In just
three months, we’ve gone
from just 1% in the polls to
being a contender for the
Democratic nomination.”
Mr. Bloomberg didn’t win
any states Tuesday but he
may have cost Mr. Bidenin Spanish, which featured
Mr. Obama praising him, ac-
cording to Kantar/CMAG.
But the former vice presi-
dent’s landslide victory in
South Carolina helped consol-
idate those blocs of voters be-
hind him, along with endorse-
ments from party leaders and
his former Democratic rivals
ahead of Super Tuesday.
Based on its internal data,
Mr. Bloomberg’s campaign
saw a big shift after South
Carolina, according to a cam-
paign aide, who added that
the effect of Mr. Biden’s win
in the state was reflected in
Tuesday’s results. In states
where many people voted
early or by mail, like Colo-
rado and Utah, Mr. Bloomberg
was performing better.
In Virginia alone, where
the state was called for Mr.
Biden as soon as polls closed,
Mr. Bloomberg spent about
$18 million on TV and radio
ads to earn roughly 10% of
the vote. In North Carolina,another state that was called
for Mr. Biden immediately af-
ter polls closed, Mr.
Bloomberg spent $15.3 mil-
lion. In those two states, Mr.
Bloomberg had more than
200 staffers and 18 offices.
Philip Balas, 68 years old,
an attorney in Palm Beach
Gardens who attended Mr.
Bloomberg’s election night
event, said Tuesday was only
a “start” for the billionaire
and praised him for spending
his money to try to defeat Mr.
Trump. “He seems to care a
lot about America, and he’s
spending money on it to bring
it back to what it used to be
and to unify America,” Mr.
Balas said.
“To me, anything is worth
that,” he said.
In a tweet Tuesday night,
Mr. Trump said Mr.
Bloomberg was the “biggest
loser of the night.” “His ‘po-
litical’ consultants took him
for a ride. $700 million
washed down the drain, and
he got nothing for it but the
nickname Mini Mike, and the
complete destruction of his
reputation. Way to go Mike!”
he said.
Earlier in the day, Mr.
Bloomberg had said at a field
office in Miami that he was
“in it to win it,” while ac-
knowledging his only path to
the Democratic nomination
was through a contested con-
vention.
He also dodged questions
about whether he was taking
votes away from Mr. Biden,
whom moderates swiftly con-
solidated behind after his
landslide victory in South
Carolina.
“Have you asked Joe
whether he’s going to drop
out?” he said in response to
questions from reporters at
his field office in Miami’s Lit-
tle Havana section. “When
you ask him that, then you
can call me.”
—Julie Bykowicz
contributed to this article.WEST PALM BEACH, Fla.—
Michael Bloomberg’s unprece-
dented spending couldn’t win
over voters in Super Tuesday
states—and his advisers are
assessing his campaign.
The former New York City
mayor spent about $215 mil-
lion of his own money on TV
and radio ads in Super Tues-
day states alone—more than
100 times what former Vice
President Joe Biden spent on
ads in those states and
roughly 12 times what Ver-
mont Sen. Bernie Sanders
spent, according to ad-track-
ing data from Kantar/CMAG.
It also is only slightly less
than the total amount the
campaigns of Mr. Sanders and
Mr. Biden spent—combined—
between launching their cam-
paigns last year and the end
of January, according to the
latest available Federal Elec-
tion Commission reports.
Overall, on TV, radio and
digital platforms, the billion-
aire put out more than $
million—an unprecedented
amount in just over three
months.
That doesn’t include the
cost of the massive campaign
operation of more than 2,
staffers Mr. Bloomberg built.
A chunk of those staffers
were based in states that
voted Tuesday.
As of primary night, with
many states still counting
votes, he had earned just a
few dozen delegates. The only
contest Mr. Bloomberg had
won was American Samoa.
Minutes before polls closed
in many states, Mr.
Bloomberg’s campaign man-
ager, Kevin Sheekey, told re-
porters the campaign would
assess the results to decide
the billionaire’s path moving
forward.
“Well, I think you make an
assessment in any campaign
like this after every time that
there’s a vote,” he said. “I
BYTARINIPARTI
Maine Opts
To Keep
Tightened
Vaccine Rule
Voters cast ballots Tuesday at Beverly Hills City Hall in California, top. Kellee Jones, above, made her choice at a church in Durham, N.C.VICTOR J. BLUE FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, ALLISON ZAUCHA FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNALMichael Bloomberg won no states on Tuesday. ‘Judge Judy’ Sheindlin stands next to him.EVA MARIE UZCATEGUI/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES)