Super Tuesday latest: Joe Biden takes Democratic lead despite Bernie Sanders taking California

Joe Biden has swept into lead to be the Democrats' challenger to Donald Trump despite rival Bernie Sanders taking Super Tuesday's biggest prize of California.

Mr Biden, who won Texas after a dramatic count, has scored a sensational comeback sweeping up in the South and taking Virginia, North Carolina, Alabama, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Minnesota, Arkansas and Massachusetts.

He is now on track to win ten of the 14 states taking, with American media reporting the election is now a two-man race.

Although the contenders were neck and neck in Maine where Mr Biden has a one point lead with 34 per cent of the vote to Sanders' 33 per cent.

The remaining Democratic candidates' battled for delegates in 14 states and one US territory with a series of high-stakes elections that marked the most significant day of voting in the nomination fight.

Mr Sanders’ conclusive win in California signalled a huge reversal in a state he lost four years ago, but he scored just three other decisive victories: his home state of Vermont, along with Utah and Colorado.

Claiming the top prize threatened to change the narrative of a night that was otherwise seen as a big resurgence for former Vice President Mr Biden, who claimed the battleground states of North Carolina and Virginia in a strong showing early on.

Texas, the second biggest prize of the night, was initially a close race between Mr Sanders and Mr Biden however, projections have shown Mr Biden as the clear winner before people had finished voting.

Mr Sanders had been favourite to win the race since his landslide victory in Nevada in February.

Bernie Sanders is accompanied by his relatives, including his wife Jane, as he addresses supporters at his Super Tuesday night rally in Vermont (REUTERS)
Reuters

Super Tuesday is crucial to winning the Democratic party's nomination for November's presidential election as it has about a third of all the delegates up for grabs.

As of 10am (GMT), Mr Biden had a total of 453 delegates to Bernie Sanders' 382, Elizabeth Warren had 50, Michael Bloomberg 44, Pete Buttigieg 26, Amy Klobucher seven and Tulsi Gabbard one.

Mr Biden establishing a lead of 72 delegates over Mr Sanders, he is now projected to win ten out of 14 states.

Candidates need an overall total of 1991 to take the party's nomination uncontested however, no one has yet reached this figure.

If no candidate manages to get a majority on the first ballot, this is called a 'contested convention' and party bigwigs - known as superdelegates - will be able to take part in another round of voting.

The wins in heavily African American states complemented former Mr Biden’s victory in last weekend's South Carolina primary. Virginia was especially key because it was heavily contested by Mr Sanders and billionaire former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg over the past week.

Super Tuesday - In pictures

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Mike Bloomberg appeared on state ballots for the first time on Super Tuesday, having avoided earlier contests.

Mr Bloomberg has poured $500 million of his personal fortune into his campaign and has faced increasing pressure to prove it was all worth it.

As yet, he has failed to win any states, his only victory being that of American Samoa.

The Billionaire's aides have revealed he is discussing whether to drop out despite thanking his supporters and tweeting to say "we're more determined than ever to defeat Donald Trump and rebuild America".

Mr Sanders took to the stage in Burlington, Vermont for a Super Tuesday rally, telling cheering supporters: "Everybody said it couldn't be done.”

“But tonight I tell you with absolute confidence: We're going to win the Democratic nomination, and we are going to defeat the most dangerous president in the history of this nation."

A once-jumbled primary arrived at the most pivotal night of voting as an increasingly well-defined battle between leftist Democrats who back the likes of Mr Sanders and Elizabeth Warren and centrists preferring Mr Biden.

Two other moderates, Amy Klobuchar and Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, both left the race in the run-up to Super Tuesday, then dramatically endorsed Mr Biden on Monday.

This helped unify moderates behind the former vice president, whose campaign risked collapsing until his resounding win in South Carolina.

The Democrat candidates in the Super Tuesday battle

A turnaround would be all the more surprising because Super Tuesday was supposed to be about fundraising and strong political organisation.

Mr Biden largely had neither and yet still looked poised for a strong night. Sanders, an avowed democratic socialist, argued that the party's elders were scrambling to block him from a nomination it appeared just last week he could run away with.

"The political establishment has made their choice: Anybody but Bernie Sanders," Mr Sanders’ campaign manager Faiz Shakir wrote in a fundraising message Tuesday.

"You cannot beat Trump with the same-old, same-old kind of politics," Mr Sanders later declared.

"The truth is, we've always known we were taking on the entire damn 1 percent of this country," Shakir added. "But we have something they do not have: people. Lots and lots of people."

Virginia is a traditional swing state that has moved more reliably Democratic in recent years, especially as people living in densely populated communities outside Washington turned their back on President Donald Trump, as many suburban voters have around the country.

Vermont first sent Mr Sanders to Congress in 1990, and that he'd win it was never in doubt. He was even holding a victory rally Tuesday in his hometown of Burlington, where he was once mayor.

Mr Sanders' campaign is optimistic about Colorado, and the senator himself has predicted victory in California - which could make it a strong night for him, depending on what also happens in Texas.

Mr Biden has trumpeted his strong support among African American Democrats and has now done what he wanted and racked up wins across the South.

"People are talking about a revolution. We started a movement," Mr Biden said in Los Angeles.

Some polls in Tennessee were ordered to extend voting hours in the wake of a tornado hitting the state which has killed 25 people and injured many.

While polling stations in California and Texas have been plagued with long delays with some reporting to have waited almost seven hours to vote.

The Tennessee Democratic Party and the presidential campaigns of Biden, Sanders Bloomberg and Warren successfully sued Davidson County election officials and the secretary of state's office to extend voting for three hours beyond their scheduled 7pm local time close.

AP VoteCast, a survey of the electorate, showed Mr Biden with a significant lead among black voters in Alabama, with roughly 6 in 10 supporting the former vice president. Black voters made up more than half of the Democratic primary electorate in the state.

In both Virginia and North Carolina, roughly half of black voters supported Mr Biden.

Mr Sanders, who had already won New Hampshire and Nevada and secured a virtual first-place tie in Iowa, was the favourite in Maine however, it is now likely Mr Biden will win the state.

Mr Biden has also run away with Ms Warren's home state of Massachusetts, as he also won Minnesota. Although his last-minute visit to Utah on Monday to scrounge for votes did not work and Ms Sanders is now projected to win that state.

Ms Warren's campaign hasn't predicted outright victory anywhere voting Tuesday, but is hoping to pick up delegates in Colorado and California.

Her top advisers have predicted that no candidate may get to the convention with enough delegates to secure the nomination - potentially positioning Ms Warren for the role of kingmaker.

A one-time front-runner, Ms Warren will increasingly face pressure to drop out of the race if she doesn't win her home state. But, during a rally in suburban Detroit, Warren vowed to soldier on.

"I was not born a politician, but I was born a fighter," she told a cheering crowd.

Texas and California account for 643 delegates - or about a third of the nearly 2,000 needed to clinch the nomination.

In all, Super Tuesday offered 1,344 new delegates, or around 34 per cent of all the total up for grabs nationwide.

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