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DEMOCRATIC WHITE HOUSE candidate Pete Buttigieg holds a wafer-thin lead over rival Bernie Sanders as more delayed results arrived, after the US election season kicked off with caucuses in Iowa.
With 97% of precincts now reporting after Monday’s selection process in the midwestern state, the moderate 38-year-old Buttigieg, a former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, was leading with 26.2%.
Senator Sanders, who is 78 years old and is making his second charge for the nomination in four years, is snapping at his heels on 26.1%.
Fellow progressive Senator Elizabeth Warren stands at 18.2%, while former vice president Joe Biden, the national frontrunner, was fourth with 15.8%.
Technical glitches
Iowa’s quirky, old-fashioned caucus process was marred by technical glitches that forced an embarrassing delay in reporting of results in the closely watched contest.
The 77-year-old Biden, like Buttigieg already campaigning in the next state to vote, New Hampshire, acknowledged that his poor showing in Iowa was a “gut punch”, but insisted he would stick it out.
The key figures released by the Iowa Democratic Party are percentages of the all-important delegates that the state sends to the national convention to vote for in the nomination process.
Buttigieg, a virtual unknown nationally one year ago, startled political observers by seizing the top spot over Sanders who had been leading in Iowa polls ahead of the caucuses.
Iowa’s pick has a recent historical track record of going on to become the national Democratic nominee.
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The lack of fight from Bernie is frustrating! The DNC shafted him in ’16 and instead of speaking out about it he worked his ass off for HRC. She later blamed him after she lost (as well as blaming everyone/everything else bar herself). Now HRC is attacking him again and the DNC are working against him again. He still refuses to fight back. Reminds me of Corbyn. If he can’t defend himself from those in his own party, how could he expect to fight against DT if he won the nomination?
@JackSimpson: dead right. Very frustrating to watch. If he gets shafted this time, he has to run as an independent (I know he won’t).
@JackSimpson: I love the revisionist history you have going on here :)
Bernie Saunders was never a Democrat, he was ALWAYS an Independent right up until 2015 when he joined so he could be on the ticket. (and left again in 2016, only to rejoin in 2019 to again run as a democratic Candidate)
Unsurprisingly, the candidate that had spent nearly her entire political life as a member of the Democratic party was going to be viewed more favourably.
As to your claim that “instead of speaking out about it he worked his ass off for HRC” seems to forget that he took over a month to endorse Clinton. I don’t doubt his motives for the delay but you are deliberately mis-representing history with the claims.
And he’s not a Democrat. He just joined to get on the ticket and left when he didn’t get it. So it’s not “his own party”.
@Tricia G: ah Tricia you should know by now that low IQ Jack Simpson is just a trumpet and is now moving his posts narrative to ‘Bernie Sanders’ as it is election year – he doesn’t actually mean ( or understand ) most of what he is spouting – just has to include Obama , Obama , Obama , Clinton Clinton Clinton and now Sanders Sanders etc – have you not spotted he mostly only posts (ad naseum ) on Trump articles with whatever the Republican / Trump talking points of the day are – watch and enjoy for the rest of 2020 – but don’t expect any great insights in his posts – and he moves on to personal insults as soon as you start to highlight his low IQ. Sad.
@Dave Hammond: wow t d are realshills for dem establishmet bernie was cheateddnc riggedithrcrevisionists betnie woulda won
@Matthew O’Kane: eh…yes Matthew that’s exactly what I was thinking too.
@Tricia G: Sanders did work tirelessly for Clinton . How long did Clinton take to endorse Obama? And do you remember her reason for the delay?
@Sean Roche: June 3rd Obama was presumptive nominee, Hillary endorsed him Jun 7th.
But let’s be clear, I didn’t mention anything about what Bernie did after he endorsed her, I was referring to the delay in endorsing her and the claim that the Democratic Party is Bernie’s “own party”.
@Tricia G: 1) True, BS was an independent for the majority of his career BUT he has had, on/off, close links with the dems since the 80s.
2) It’s irrelevant that he was an independent up to ’15. If the DNC didnt want to treat him fairly why did they allow him to contest the nomination? All nominees should be treated fairly and it is a fact that he wasn’t.
3) After what happened+since he isnt a typical dem, HRC was lucky he endorsed her at all. It actually appears he worked harder for her in ’16 than she had in ’07/’08 for Obama.
4) “its not his own party” – well if he wins the nomination + takes a leaf out of DTs book (fights back), he could take the party over as DT has done with the reps.
@Dave Hammond: Taking a break from shoving crayons up your nose I see! Btw you should be careful with that…I’d say brain cells are few and far between. You cant afford to lose anymore.
Honestly I think Bernie is the only one who has a hope of getting elected, I can see him taking a lot more voters from Trump than the others since he appeals to the working class more.
@Keith O’Reilly: In my opinion your right saying that he’s the only one who can beat Trump. If sanders wins the DNC vote he have his supporters and nearly all Democrats will vote for him. Where as if he doesn’t win his supporters will vote Trump as a two finger salute to the DNC.
And they want to run the country?
Do we feel the Bern or the Butt?
@Sim0n: neither , #KAGA , 4 more years.
@Sim0n: Feeling the butt is Trump’s purview
Have the DNC confirmed that all the Sanders votes that went to Deval Patrick have been put back to Sanders or why they dripped results out instead of waiting. I don’t like to jump to conspiracy theories but dripping the results over 3 days sounds like they are hoping that interest in story will fade. How many articles have spoken about the amount of Sanders votes went to Deval Patrick or Mayor Petes ties to the app runners. This is sickening and puts Sanders supports who care about the democratic process and complain into the tin foil hat section. It’s disgusting.
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@Anna69: Go away.
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