South Carolina might be the third state in line after Iowa and New Hampshire to help decide who the Democratic nominee will be, but for former Vice President Joe Biden, it will be his first major test.
For the first time in three tries, Biden has a realistic chance of not only seeing his campaign reach the South Carolina primary, but in winning the contest when it occurs in late February 2020.
During the 1988 presidential cycle, Biden’s campaign was trapped in 1987 when he dropped out of the race in September of that year. In 2008, Biden dropped out the day of the Iowa caucus after placing fifth.
Now, having served eight years under former President Barack Obama, Biden holds a wide lead (as recently as March) over the field in the Palmetto State.
Antjuan Seawright, a Democratic strategist and South Carolina native, told the Washington Examiner that no other state before South Carolina will have 55% of women and 60% of African-Americans voting in a presidential primary.
“The issues we face in South Carolina, and the voting demographics are very reflective of what I think the mood and the current temperature of [the Democratic] party,” Seawright explained.
He believes that Biden’s hiring of Symone Sanders, who’s African American and the former press secretary to Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign, is a boon to putting him over the top in South Carolina. Why? Sanders is well-respected in Democratic circles, particularly among African Americans, and more than 1-in-4 South Carolinians are African American.
“[Symone] is a very powerful woman. She has a very powerful voice in this space, and she’s highly respected among African American females, arguably the most loyal voting bloc within [the Democratic] party,” Seawright said. “She’s going to make a difference.”
In November 2016, shortly after Trump won the election, Sanders told CNN’s Brianna Keilar that “we don’t need white people leading the Democratic Party right now.”
Seawright dismissed that premise, saying, “What’s most important […] is to have someone who can lead and who can speak to the issues that most people in communities like mine face. That doesn’t necessarily mean that because of a person’s color they cannot lead on the issues that matter to our community.”
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