Biden and Trump win more primaries in Tuesday’s primaries. Other races will provide hints about national politics
PATRICK ORSAGOS, CODY JACKSON, MICHELLE L. PRICE and BILL BARROWMarch 19, 2024
President Biden and Donald Trump won several of their parties’ primaries on Tuesday, gaining more delegates as they continue their march toward a rematch in November’s presidential election.
Biden, a Democrat, and Trump, a Republican, easily won the primaries in Kansas, Ohio and Illinois on Tuesday. Trump also won the Republican primaries in Florida. There was no contest for Biden to win in Florida, as Democrats there canceled their primaries and opted to award all 224 delegates to him, a move that takes precedence for a sitting president. Trump and Biden are also expected to easily win Tuesday’s primaries in Arizona, boosting support after becoming presumptive nominees for their party last week.
Other races outside the presidency could provide insight into the national political mood. In Ohio’s Republican Senate primary, Trump-backed businessman Bernie Moreno defeated two challengers: Ohio Secretary of State Frank Frank LaRose and Matt Dolan, whose family owns the Cleveland Guardians baseball team.
Chicago voters will decide whether to impose a one-time property tax to pay for new services for the homeless. And California voters will choose a replacement for former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, who resigned his seat after being ousted from the Republican leadership.
Trump and Biden have been focused on the general election for weeks, lately focusing their campaigns on states that could be competitive in November, rather than just states holding primaries.
Trump, a voter from Florida, cast his vote at a Palm Beach recreation center on Tuesday and told reporters: I voted for Donald Trump.
On Saturday he convened in Ohio, which has been a reliably Republican party for several years after once being a national bellwether in presidential elections. Trump won the state by about 8 percentage points in 2016 and 2020. But there are signs the state could be more competitive in 2024. Last year, Ohio voted overwhelmingly to protect abortion rights in its constitution and voted to legalize marijuana.
Biden visited Nevada and Arizona on Tuesday, two states that were among the closest in 2020 and remain top priorities for both campaigns.
Trump and Biden are reviewing their terms in office and seeing the other as a threat to America. Trump, 77, portrays the 81-year-old Biden as mentally unfit. The president has described his Republican rival as a threat to democracy following his attempt to overturn the 2020 election results while praising foreign strongmen.
Those topics were clearly visible at some polling stations on Tuesday.
President Biden, I don’t think he knows how to tie his shoes anymore, said Trump supporter Linda Bennet, a resident of Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, not far from the former president’s Mar-a-Lago resort.
While echoing Trump’s arguments about Biden, she criticized Trump’s rhetoric and the way he is portraying himself as not presidential at all. But she said the former president is a man of his word, and she said the country, especially the economy, felt stronger. to her under Trump’s leadership.
In Columbus, Ohio, Democrat Brenda Woodfolk voted for Biden and shared the president’s stated choice this fall.
It’s scary, she said of the prospect that Trump could be back in the Oval Office. Trump wants to be a dictator and talk about making America white again and all that nonsense. There’s too much hate.”
Bennet and Woodfolk agreed that immigration
in is
one of their biggest concerns, although they expressed differing opinions on why.
This border thing has gotten out of hand, Bennet said. I think it’s the government’s plot or plan to involve these people and change the whole dynamic in their favor, so I’m pretty pissed off.
Woodfolk said she doesn’t mind immigrants sharing opportunities in the U.S., but worries it comes at the expense of people who have been here all their lives.
Trump and Republicans have pressed Biden in recent years over the influx of migrants crossing the U.S.-Mexico border, seeking to capitalize on the issue far beyond the border states. Biden has launched a counteroffensive in recent weeks after Senate Republicans quashed a migration compromise they negotiated with the White House, only withholding their support after Trump said he opposed the deal. Biden has used the circumstances to argue that Trump and Republicans have no interest in resolving the issue but instead want to incite voters in an election year.
Over the past year, Trump has tied his campaign to his legal challenges, including dozens of criminal and civil cases requiring him to pay more than $500 million in fines.
His first criminal trial was set to begin Monday in New York on charges that he falsified company records to cover up hush money payments. But a judge postponed the trial for 30 days following the recent disclosure of new evidence that Trump’s lawyers said they needed time to review.
Associated Press writer Orsagos reported from Columbus, Jackson from Palm Beach Gardens, Price from New York and Barrow from Atlanta. AP writer Jill Colvin in New York contributed to this report.

Fernando Dowling is an author and political journalist who writes for 24 News Globe. He has a deep understanding of the political landscape and a passion for analyzing the latest political trends and news.