HARRISBURG, Pa. — President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump stood before voters Tuesday in Pennsylvania's presidential primary, a prelude to November's general election. The state is once again expected to play a key role in the race for the White House.
Both candidates have already won their respective parties' primaries after securing the nomination.
On March 12, Biden became the Democratic nominee and Trump became the Republican candidate, but neither faced serious opposition in their respective primary votes in Pennsylvania. Dean Phillips is the other Democratic candidate in the state, and Nikki Haley is the only Republican on the ballot.
Of note, however, may be the number of “unsolicited” write-in votes cast in the Democratic primary in protest of Biden's handling of the Israel-Hamas war.
Both candidates have been campaigning in Pennsylvania this month, focusing more on the November election and each other than Tuesday's vote.
Biden visited his hometown of Scranton, as well as Pittsburgh and Philadelphia last week. A few days earlier, President Trump held a rally in North Whitehall Township, Lehigh County, in his third visit to the state this year.
Voters will see more of them, their TV ads and their surrogates campaigning over the next six months in states that swung from the Trump administration in 2016 to the Biden administration in 2020. It's going to happen.
Pennsylvania, which has 19 electors, was one of three key battleground states, along with Michigan and Wisconsin, that narrowly voted for Trump in 2016, after voting for Democratic presidential candidates for about 30 years. won. Four years later, Biden won all three states by winning Pennsylvania by about 80,000 votes out of more than 6.9 million cast, but those states remain important prizes in this November's election. It has become.
“This is a big day for Pennsylvania. I hope people get out and vote,” President Trump told reporters outside a courthouse in New York City on Tuesday. “It's important to vote and let us know that we're coming on November 5th. We're going to make great strides.”
Mr. Biden visited Mr. Trump's home state of Florida on Tuesday to campaign in Tampa. He attacked the Sunshine State's new policy banning abortions after six weeks of pregnancy. It is scheduled to take effect on May 1st. President Trump has voiced opposition to the ban, but has said abortion is a matter for each state to decide.
Biden lost Florida and its 30 electoral votes to Trump in 2020 by a margin of 3.3 percentage points.
