Biden dominates Sanders in Lafayette County, Mississippi primary
Published 11:00 am Wednesday, March 11, 2020
It took fewer than five minutes after the polls closed in Mississippi to give former Vice President Joseph Biden the victory in the Magnolia State.
The Democratic candidate, whose campaign was once feared to be on life support, continued his recent surge through the primaries, picking up 31 pledged delegates in Mississippi by winning 81 percent of the vote. It was a decisive victory for Biden over fellow Democratic opponent Senator Bernie Sanders, who managed to only pick up two delegates and 14 percent of the vote on Tuesday.
Biden swept Mississippi, winning in all 82 counties. In Lafayette County, he won by 41 percent, receiving 3,049 votes to Sanders’ 1,228 votes. U.S. Representative Tusli Gabbard, the only other Democratic candidate still in the race, picked up 27 votes and finished fifth in Lafayette County.
Despite backing out of the race after Super Tuesday on March 3, Bloomberg still picked up 90 votes (1.9 percent) in Lafayette County. He was also the only candidate to open an office in Lafayette County. Elizabeth Warren picked up 99 votes, and Pete Buttigieg picked up 18 votes.
President Donald Trump faced opposition from two other candidates in Mississippi’s Republican primary, but defeated them with ease. Trump picked up 98.6 percent of the vote, while Bill Weld and Roque De La Fuenta combining for 1.3 percent of the vote. In Lafayette County, Trump received 2,389 votes and the next closest was Weld, with 25 votes.
A November election that will garner attention locally is the 1st Congressional District race between incumbent Republican Trent Kelly and the Democratic Socialist candidate Antonia Eliason. During Tuesday’s primary each was uncontested but Eliason, a professor at the University of Mississippi School of Law, received 3,569 votes to Kelly’s 2,360.
This fall will also see a rematch against Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith and Mike Espy. Espy won the Democratic primary race easily over Tobey Bernard Bartee and Jensen Bohren by receiving 93 percent of the vote. He won every county except for Clarke County, which was won by Bartee. In Lafayette County Espy received 4,000 votes while Bartee and Bohren picked up 194 votes each.
In 2018, Smith defeated Espy by just over 66,000 votes in a runoff election after neither received enough votes during a special election.
Less than a quarter of Lafayette County’s registered voters participated in this year’s primary. On Tuesday, 6,331 of the 31,667 registered (19.9 percent) cast their ballot on Tuesday. There were an additional 677 voters who cast an absentee ballot, bringing the total number to 7,008 (22.1 percent.).