UPDATE: Since writing this, a judge rejected Gov. Mike DeWine’s effort to delay the primary. Then, DeWine asked the Ohio Department of Health to order the polls closed.
The coronavirus outbreak has forced Ohio to delay its primary on Tuesday, which is a strong sign that the Democratic presidential race is likely going on hiatus for a while.
Ohio is one of four important primary states scheduled to vote on Tuesday and was expected to allow front-runner Joe Biden to pile on more delegates, making the math even more daunting for Sen. Bernie Sanders.
Just a day before the primary, Gov. Mike DeWine announced that it would be impossible to hold a primary without violating new CDC guidance limiting gatherings to under 50 people. Beyond the crowds, in-person voting is an added concern because many of the workers at polling stations tend to be older and thus are more vulnerable to having a more severe form of the disease.
The state will now be accepting absentee ballots for the next few months but is delaying in-person voting until June 2.
As of this writing, Illinois, Florida, and Arizona are still planning on going ahead with their primaries on Tuesday. But Georgia delayed its primary until May and Louisiana also until June. Both had been scheduled to vote in the coming weeks.
Given how quickly events are moving, even if the rest of tomorrow’s primaries go ahead, it’s becoming more likely that other states will delay theirs.
The coronavirus has already effectively sabotaged the Democratic presidential campaign. Sanders and Biden have canceled all rallies in favor of online events. Sunday night’s debate had to be moved from a live audience to the CNN studios, with the candidates greeting each other with an elbow bump and the coronavirus dominating all conversations.
Following the debate, Sanders said in an interview that it made sense to consider delaying primaries.
The tricky part is that, even though Biden has opened up an insurmountable lead, he still technically needs 1,100 delegates to win a majority and thus become the Democratic nominee.
So, it’s this odd situation in which everybody pretty much knows who the nominee will be, but, as long as Sanders remains in the race, Democrats will be in a sort of holding pattern.
