Super Tuesday primaries 2024: Trump and Biden dominate, Haley drops out
538 tracked how Trump and Haley did, plus key U.S. House and Senate races.
March 5 was Super Tuesday — the biggest election day of the year until the one in November! With former President Donald Trump projected to win 14 of the day's 15 GOP presidential nominating contests, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley announced Wednesday morning that she is suspending her campaign.
It was also the first downballot primary day of 2024, with important contests for Senate, House and governor in states like Alabama, California, North Carolina and Texas.
538 reporters, analysts and contributors broke down the election results as they came in with live updates, analysis and commentary. Read our full live blog below.
Latest headlines:
Downballot, Trump’s endorsees are winning in Texas
As Nathaniel and I discussed earlier, dynamics in the Texas state legislative elections have been particularly contentious this year, with the governor and Trump endorsing at least eight challengers to Republican incumbents in the state House. As of now, seven of those challengers are currently leading their primaries, though a few look headed to a runoff. One challenger, Barry Wernick in the 108th, is trailing by just 2 points.
—Mary Radcliffe, 538
It’s ovah in Minnesota
ABC News projects that Biden will win the Minnesota Democratic primary, and Trump will win the Republican primary. Biden’s win is expected, but also salt in the wound for his highest-profile competitor, Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips, who gave up a safe seat in Congress and the potential for a strong statewide run in a few years to launch his no-shot challenge against Biden.
—Jacob Rubashkin, Inside Elections
Trump projected to win Massachusetts
ABC News projects that Trump will win the Massachusetts primary, his 10th win of the evening. With 15 percent of the expected vote reporting, Trump is leading Haley in the Bay State 59 percent to 37 percent. Yet again, this is another state where Haley was hoping to do well: Massachusetts has a lot of college graduates, and it allows independents and Democrats to vote in the Republican primary. But with Trump’s win, the Haley campaign turns its lonely eyes to Vermont.
—Nathaniel Rakich, 538
Trump opens up lead in Vermont
With 56 percent of the expected vote now reporting, Trump has opened up a bit of a lead against Haley in Vermont. He has half the vote, and Haley is just behind him with 47 percent. Still, that's closer than the two polls, had us expecting. There's still room for Haley to pull out a win, which she would need: all of the state's 17 primary delegates go to the winner. That is, unless they both end up with under 50 percent of the vote, in which case they split the delegates proportionally.
—Monica Potts, 538
Several incumbents ousted in the Texas state House
As we explained yesterday, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and Trump all set out to defeat several incumbent Republicans in the Texas state House yesterday (albeit for different reasons). The Associated Press has now projected winners in most of those races, and here's how they turned out: In total, at least eight Republican incumbents lost their primaries after being targeted by one of those three men. Another seven, including Speaker Dade Phelan, were forced into runoffs.
Abbott's muscle looks like it was the most effective: Five of the 10 incumbents he targeted (over their opposition to his school-voucher plan) lost, and another three went to runoffs. Trump also did OK: Two of the eight incumbents he targeted lost, and three more went to runoffs. Paxton didn't have as high of a success rate: Only seven of the 35 incumbents he targeted lost, although seven more were forced into runoffs. That's maybe not too surprising, though, since unlike Abbott, Paxton didn't put a ton of money where his mouth was.
—Nathaniel Rakich, 538