Strong Debate Performance Doesn’t Translate for Rubio; Clinton Sweeps the South

By Andrew Watson Last updated Mar 7, 2016

CONCORD, NH - APRIL 21: Democratic presidential hopeful and former U.S. Sectetary of State Hillary Clinton (L) laughs while speaking with students and faculty of New Hampshire Technical Institute, Concord Community College, on April 21, 2015 in Concord, New Hampshire. The conversation revolved around higher education, manufacturing and women in the work force. (Photo by Andrew Burton/Getty Images)

Photo Credit: For America

Last week’s Republican debate featured an aggressive, supercharged Marco Rubio who went after front runner Donald Trump with a vengeance. However effective his tactics may have seemed, they did not translate to any sort of success on Super Tuesday, as Rubio now sits last among the three frontrunners with just 87 del- egates in total.

Cruz and Rubio teamed up against Donald Trump at the debate, calling him out on his lawsuit involving Trump University, his hiring of foreign workers for his construction projects, his tendency to be vague and repetitive and his financial contributions to multiple democratic congressmen including Chuck Schumer (D- NY). Trump struggled with the barrage and lashed out at both of them, calling Rubio a “con artist” and Cruz a “liar,” per The New York Times.

The other two candidates, Dr. Ben Carson and Ohio Governor Jon Kasich were rel- egated to the sidelines, mostly spectators of the circus that was occurring at center stage. Mr. Rubio turned the tables on Donald Trump, saying he was the one repeating himself con- stantly. Mr. Trump refuted this by saying “I don’t repeat myself ” no less than five consecutive times. It put on full display the level that the GOP infighting has reached, with the establishment desperately trying to slow down Mr. Trump, hurling everything including the kitchen sink at him.

On the democratic side, things were less openly tense but Clinton supporters sensed blood in the water after a resounding victory in South Carolina that saw Clinton take 86 percent of the African American vote. Sanders admitted to his struggles with Black voters, saying that he “got decimated,” according to Politico. However, he has said that he will take his nomination all the way to the convention and that Super Tuesday was not the end of the road. Clinton’s camp played up the importance of Super Tuesday as she expected to win at least seven of the eleven states.

As Super Tuesday came and went, the polls held for the most part, with Donald Trump taking 203 delegates and seven states while Hillary swept the South minus the state of Okla- homa. She also took Massa- chusetts, giving her a total of 453 delegates.

In second place in each party, Sanders won his home state of Vermont in addition to Colorado, Oklahoma and Minnesota, taking 284 delegates. Texas Junior Senator Ted Cruz won his home state in addition to Alaska and Oklahoma, accumulating 144 delegates.

In third was Marco Rubio who only won Minnesota but managed to gain 71 delegates based on his popularity in high population counties with lots of delegates in states that he lost. Here is a look at the overall delegate count, accord- ing to The New York Times. A Republican candidate needs 1,237 to win while the democratic candidate will need 2,383.

Senator Cruz spun his wins in big states like Texas and Oklahoma as a victory, say- ing in his speech that he is the only campaign to have beaten Donald Trump in a primary. He not so subtly called for Senator Marco Rubio to drop out so that votes can be con- solidated against Mr. Trump. Meanwhile, Mr. Trump gave a resounding victory speech and railed against Hillary Clinton and his Republican opponents while saying that he was going to the “make the party bigger”. Mr. Rubio had a “disastrous” Super Tuesday, per The New Republic. Thus, he will look ahead to the primary in his home state of Florida, where 99 delegates will all go to the winner.

Trump is “comfortably” ahead in the state of Florida. The path to the nomination is much clearer now for Donald Trump, while Mr. Cruz and Mr. Rubio will be counting on a lot to go wrong for them to secure the nomination or force a brokered convention. For Mr. Sanders, his victories in liberal strongholds like Vermont and Minnesota keep him in the running and with his donations racking up (36 million in the month of February, mostly in small donations) he appears to be in it until the convention.

Although Hillary can claim momentum out of Super Tuesday with seven victories, she cannot yet look ahead to the general as she has a lot of work to do in upcoming states. Those states included Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Nebraska, Puerto Rico and Hawaii among others.