the italian government is preparing drastic measures to fight the coronavirus including closing all schools universities and cinemas playing major football matches behind closed doors $28.00 people have died in the last 24 hours taking the death toll to $107.00 that's the highest off to china the epicenter of the outbreak . iran has announced another 15 deaths raising the total to 92 nearly 3000 people have been infected there landslides and flooding in brazil have killed at least 12 people and forced thousands from their homes dozens remain unaccounted for the governor there says the equivalent of a month's worth of rain fell in just 12 oz well those are the headlines the news continues here on al jazeera off the inside story stay with us.

a super tuesday rebound for joe biden was the biggest day of voting in the democratic race to challenge donald trump for the white house bernie sanders doing well in california so what does that mean for the party's nomination in the run up to the u.s. presidential election in november this is inside story. hello and welcome to the program i'm peter davi super tuesday a big group of states get to have their say and it was super for joe biden the states have given him a lead in delegates he appears to be the party's front runner so far it is

a remarkable comeback when all expectations favored his main rival bernie sanders biden sees sweeping victory was during the most important voting day and the democrats race for the white house mike bloomberg and elizabeth warren might be dead in the political water now but bernie sanders still has a good chance he's grabbed california the day's big prize with the most number of delegates so it looks like these 2 will now slug it out state by state until the party convention and then on into the election. the last few days you know the press the funny thing declared you can't marry the i'm going to change so i'm going off all on the internet john we're going to go to super tuesday and you're over well if they've got me going on the or what we need is

a new politics that breeds working class people in time our political move that was work springs young people into our political goal it was and which in november will create all hires voter turnout in american political history it was. ok there we are here we go let's bring in our guests today joining us from boston we have james pindell he's a politics reporter for the boston globe out of new york on skype we have linda sauce or she's an activist and a campaign a known as a national surrogate for bunny soundless and in the u.k. we have scott lucas he's a professor of american studies at the university of birmingham and co-founder of the news and analysis website the trump project welcome to you will james in boston so joe biden's got

a bounce how did he manage it. well it's stunning what if the story line all year has been that democrats in the united states very much wanted to find the person they think can defeat donald trump in the fall election it was the the answer to that was not clear throughout most of the year would it be biden would it be other people like people to judge or someone else after the sarah days south carolina primary where he had a convincing win the moderate lane seemed to figure out that for whatever reason it would be joe biden is the person that they would back and that they believe is the most electable this race is far from over but right now is a stunning victory in states that he was not supposed to win on super tuesday he was disposed to hold his own as bernie sanders grew a delegate lead but the crew didn't happen it's a shocking result today linda in new york why does california love bernie sanders

so much california loves bernie sanders because it has a lot of young people it has a very large latino community which has been coming out for bernie sanders on in significant ways and he has one of the largest muslim american communities in the country and they're and can and bernie sanders invested a lot of money there were multiple offices across the state at times of staff and hundreds and hundreds of volunteers across the state scott lucas in birmingham elizabeth warren doing badly coming in home state massachusetts and many mike bloomberg spending half a $1000000000.00 to actually come low place. mr bloomberg enjoyed finding that money in the back of a sofa because it's now lost that 500000000 he was always a sideshow for me in this campaign far more serious is what elizabeth warren does now i don't think she has a path to the nomination of course but does she drop out in the next week before the michigan primary and 5 others next tuesday or does she stay in for one more

debate alongside biden and sanders on the campaign stage possibly than helping sanders as he reestablishes himself versus biden as the remaining moderate candidate james do you think that's what she'll do she'll stay in the race for a week if only to have to drop out in 8 or 9 days but she likes to mess with joe biden between now and then i think with the question of mike bloomberg it's entirely clear what's going to happen next but with elizabeth warren day is your question it's entirely not clear she does have the money to compete in these states she has super pacs who are now backing her she's now the only woman in the contest some of these states may be ok for her in terms of getting in getting some delegates out of this and also know what the trajectory is going forward she may for example she's going to face a lot of pressure particularly from sander supporters to get out of the race but she could get around that she could say find anyone who pledges a win every delegate i get will go to bernie sanders the national convention or

maybe bernie sanders really wants elizabeth warren on that debate stage and for him for her to take out joe biden the same way that she did mike bloomberg a couple weeks ago linda sarsour in new york if we unpacked joe biden's numbers as we know them as they stand at the moment he did very well with suburban votes as much better than bernie sanders particularly in key note states like virginia how did he manage it. you know right now we're in a moment in time where we have the most important election of our lifetime you have to remember that in america where literally trying to defeat a demagogue a fascist a racist someone who has wreaked havoc on our community so i sometimes have to sit and wonder if our electorate doesn't want to take a risk on someone who has a transformative campaign someone who wants to build a vision post defeating trump joe biden right now in the moderates are not running on a platform they're running on one key thing we want to defeat trump and then everything

else stays the same and some of the elders i mean if you look at even the demographics meaning age wise young people overwhelmingly support bernie sanders but older folks just seem to feel like joe biden or moderates are going to be the most safest bet for us to defeat donald trump and they don't have a plan after that they just know they want to beat trump and the question is can they be trumped without a platform without a vision without something that inspires voters across the country and i think this race is still going on i don't think that tuesday yesterday was the day that we make the conclusion and excuse me about whether joe biden in fact continues to be the front runner scott lucas i mean i guess it be fair to say that biden and saunders a both now heading into a state by state slogan between 0 and the convention when the can when we know that the democratic presidential candidate will be what you think the tone of the slogan will be. well i think the important thing is it's not just up to biden and sanders

but i think it's also up to the media who are covering them and that is this to this point has been a very rich debate amongst democrats on what you do regarding health care with a national health care system should it be public why should it have a private option what should we do with immigration should we decriminalize and lift the stigma from member grants what are you doing with education or with economic justice and all credit to the candidates for putting that forward the more the media can continue to focus on the issues and to test biden and sanders and warren if he remains on the issues that's great once this descends into an idea of these artificial personalities of this quote center versus left moderate versus progressive once we reduce it to personalities rather than dealing with the fact that almost all democrats agree on the core issues of what needs to be done is that the risk really rather that we get sort of the spectacle over taking the substance that is here and will continue to be here as the democrats figure out what to do

versus donald trump in the autumn linda scott raises an interesting point there when he talks about the spectacle this is the substance doesn't see because with this election is the media reporting the message or is the media changing the message i mean fox news slipped to flipped over into being from t.v. 4 years ago c.n.n. one could say flipped into being the anti trump t.v. network 2 and a half or 3 years ago i don't and in fact i agree that c.n.n. is just the anti trump network i think c.n.n. is also the anti medicare for all the anti progressive left if you look at a lot of the pundits that come on channels like c.n.n. and to be honest with you even m s n b c which many of us at one point thought was a truly progressive. cable news station that they you hardly find program the voices you hardly find the voices of not the you know us and the young people that are coming out to support barry sanders i think this election is really going to. be and have to be about the issues people are not moved by just defeating

a demagogue even though they should be and we saw this happen in 2016 where literally the democratic party right now is playing out what decisions they made in 2016 when we had a well qualified woman who had a track record who was the secretary of state who was a us senator who was the 1st lady and to be that to be clear i didn't agree with her in all her issues but we had a well qualified poised woman to run against the demagogue like donald trump and we lost that so what makes us think that joe biden right now who doesn't have a plan i don't even know what the issues he's he's running on right now and bernie sanders is pivoting now and i don't know the media's going to cover his pivot but right now he's running new ads that are basically trying to educate the american people that don scuse me joe biden has been trying to cut social security and medicare and medicaid for the last 40 years is that the kind of president people want so the question to me here is not it's not always about just specific substance or about the details or about the plan the american electorate

particularly those who are not usually engaged in the political process are looking for inspiration they're looking for something a vision after trying what is the world look like the day of the inauguration of a new president that's not donald trump and joe biden hasn't been able to make that argument so i'm still worried about whether or not joe biden gets the nomination if we could really galvanize the electorate if the democratic party is not going to be so fractured during the convention that we can actually put it back together and defeat donald trump in november 2020 games from dell in boston i mean is that a fair point as far as you're concerned this is kind of a crossroads for the democrat party because they kind of don't know what they're for 'd and what their candidate potentially is for when it comes to doing anything else other than defeating donald trump. i mean they know what they're for they're for being donald trump and this idea that we've had a conversation about issues and issues matter there's been no evidence of that in the last couple of cycles donald trump defeated hillary clinton who had

a plan for everything was with one has a plan for everything and she went down on the way she would pay for that plan of medicare for all largely because it dealt with issues over authenticity did you just back off of medicare for all are you not committed you know bernie sanders doesn't exactly have a plan and how he's going to pay for his signature issue of medicare for all this isn't but really not about issues at all this is about aspiration it's about ideology it is about head and heart and i know we're going to go back to the media saying that this is look at what voters are saying is the number one issue and this one number that one thing that bernie sanders has been talking about is why he thinks he can defeat trump going forward of course i also don't necessarily agree it's going to be a state by state contest this thing could be kind of over in terms of the political argument it made last the whole time but it may be over in a couple of weeks and the next week for example is going to be a good week for joe biden he already has a delegate lead he will grow in that delegate lead bernie sanders has probably 2 of

the $42.00 of the 6 states that are good for him north dakota washington state michigan is clearly going to be a battlefield i'm headed out there tomorrow but mississippi alone and probably missouri that particular mississippi joe biden could double his delegate lead and then after that we have the march 17th states big states for joe biden illinois a florida arizona these are some big contests the right now bernie sanders has not been pulling very well in and that could almost be shut out argument in terms of bernie sanders his path to get the delegates he needs or even a plurality at that point he may have a long stay in the race but this could be over in terms of the argument in just a couple weeks ok linda coming back to new york what does this say about the broader appeal of the policy as much as 6 months ago. they were being very self congratulatory within the movement they were saying look we've got women of color we've got men of color we've got women we've got a gay guy in his forty's and now the appeal seems to be. black people have gone

black men and women have gone for joe biden hispanics are gone for bernie sanders but the lineup is basically to all white guys with gray hair. yeah i'm not usually inspired by old white guys but i am inspired by bernie sanders i want to make the point that a lot of people are race often and that if bernie sanders became the democratic nominee and became the president of the united states of america we would be making history he would be the 1st jewish american president that this country has ever seen he's a child of immigrants so of course he's a white man and he admits that and understand the privilege that comes with being an old white man in politics but what bernie has been able to do is historic the diversity of the campaign i've been around the country i've seen the staff from the top of the campaign to the bottom of the campaign to the volunteers across the country it's really something magnificent and the question is whether joe biden is going to be able to pull this coalition together to defeat donald trump in 2020 and

that's the thing that concerns me the most what it looks like also is that the latino vote in america is becoming a swing voter bernie is doing really well has commanding lead among latinos he's polling amongst young people and getting votes from young people at about around 70 percent yes the voters out for young people needs to increase but these are the kind of communities that need to be brought to the table ok last thing i'm going to go until today for a 2nd because we are skipping of a quickly towards in the program scott mcinnis in birmingham what does it say about the the micro demographic if you will at the very top of american politics donald trump is 73 bernie sanders is 78 joe biden is 77 i mean you know run the party convention time. the cumulative agee's will come out towards $250.00 he is old quiz the 44 year old who is the 37 year old energized female candidate and what it says is this is where we wound up in this cycle but i do

think that what a race what has happened that you pointed to earlier that is significant we have had strong women candidates who've come out in this cycle especially in 2018 for congress and then for the presidency so think about harris and where she might be 4 years from now think about elizabeth warren who won't disappear think about any club a char who was in the race until a couple days ago and i think will be a significant force going forward think about it as coming from being a small town mayor to being now a national figure think about cory booker the african-american candidate who did make a mark early on in other words there is that diversity in terms of where we were in the process even if we wound up at an outcome which may be old white guys why do i say that look there's a responsibility here quite often we have this reduced to sort of like a horse race and there's only a couple of riders standing and james pointed that out oh it's just ideologies and so on it's not there are a lot of the issues that are in play here there are

a lot of people who are in play here including as linda said on the ground and the more that we continue to acknowledge diversity and stay out of the old white guy trap the better it will be for american politics going forward james isn't there an elephant in the room here in the dynamic is this i mean you were giving us a state by state break done 5 minutes ago as both about why did discussion but the reality is whoever goes up against donald trump has got to win in the electoral college system because the popular voting system hillary clinton won by 3000000 she didn't get the gig. that's right that's why i think michigan next week is going to be really important you know those 3 states that had the white house of the president trump michigan wisconsin pennsylvania this is the 1st test in one of those primary states and one of those states next week in michigan is could be a very critical vote in terms of ideology of the party between joe biden and bernie sanders of course that is right he would be the 1st jewish president joe biden i mean a very historic campaign he the 1st president from the state of delaware it was

a joke. the gusset and coming back to linda as well i mean given the respective ages regardless of who it is do they have to be very careful when it comes to the vice presidential candidate pick as well because these people one cheeseburger away from a cardiac arrest arguably. yeah i mean their presidential vice presidential picks must be either women or women of color or at least the person of color there's just no way around it and it has to be someone that's younger to your point just in case something were to happen that we have a strong vice presidential candidate back in kind of get into that presidential seat so i hope it's a woman of color in particular and i think back to the tension how someone like joe biden and even bernie sanders to expand the electorate and win that election against donald trump when it comes to what we think their policies will be fine tuned into being depending upon who gets the nomination scott lucas in birmingham to bernie sanders some does is

a respected when it comes to preach huish and fees when it will nutrition fees when it comes to health care when it comes to free housing that thing that correct me if i'm wrong here james a lot of the american media call it socialism it's not socialism as we would recognize it but you guys label it as that don't you james. he calls it a democratic socialist and calls the revolution i don't the sure i've ever labeled it those plans as socialist obviously it moves further to the left than any president in american history but to the point earlier making a move to talk with scott about it more but on these particular issues there is no particular price tag it's just it's a slogan it's a phrase it's an aspiration and you can debate the aspiration but in terms of the actual running down on issue after issue this is not what has been motivating voters in these last couple of cycles. should have stayed with you for my last question soup so for the apologize in 2016 some votes is if you want to pack the numbers 4 years ago some voters must have gone by definition from barack obama to

donald trump or they went from a bomb to the sofa because they were so annoyed with what was going on in politics how does whoever it ends up being get those people off the sofa they put on the t.v. flick and they go and vote for somebody. well let's cut through spending get to reality for example you talked about the reality of what bernie sanders is aspiring to do with education and health care and our baby is all well how is he going to price that fact of the matter is is that the current incumbent donald trump presided over an on affordable tax cut and is now running a federal budget deficit of one trillion dollars per year all you have to do is to reverse the priorities in america to stop giving a giveaway tax cut to start thinking about how to responsibly manage the economy and you might be able to provide for these public services which leads me to my wider point at the end of the day beyond the spectacle which did help trump fact the matter is the economy that motivates americans do they have an assured roof

over their heads can their kids get an education do they have stable jobs which is way of saying that we are looking at next week in the week after what could happen the overarching thing here is is for example if you have an economy that dips or goes into recession it changes this immediately and who is the more capable person to deal with economic downturn donald trump or bernie sanders and joe biden i think that's going to be the defining factor as we move towards november so clearly james the republicans will now be thinking they've got to get bernie sanders and joe biden both of them into respective sets of crosshairs if you will political crosses out of the 2 of them who is the weak. i don't i don't know and here's why i don't know. the term of electability which is obviously on the minds of so many voters right now they're all playing pundit they're trying to figure out you know what will voters in michigan and wisconsin in pennsylvania how will they vote in november it's not who they actually like but the idea of electability as you asked

earlier is being redefined after president trump was elected in 2016 for example african-american turnout was down significantly in detroit from obama to hillary clinton if she could just increase it a little bit i mean had some drop off she would probably be president you can go down the line the same way with every american turnout in pennsylvania also in milwaukee if you have a person in by the way in wisconsin in this is a part of the bernie sanders argument the as a green party candidate no more progressive scale who had more votes than the margin of victory of trump over hillary clinton so if brady sanders wants to say 'd that electability doesn't mean a straight old white guy moderate means maybe a perm or progressive person he may be correct so in terms of trying to decide who is more electable i don't think we quite know yet and and to scott's point if we're headed to recession it may be any democrat anyway last point to linda sarsour in

new york is this something of a course correction looking at the broader picture of u.s. politics because for example if i was to stand in 2052 he would still be younger than older possible candidates but will be standing this year so at some point it's got to tilt surely further than just having a woman on the v.p. ticket it's got to go further than that if only to show the electorate themselves. i mean us our system on the presidential level is broken the amounts of money and investment that requires someone to be able to raise nationally to even compete in a presidential bid on the local level on particular on the congressional level we are seeing young people young women of color people like alexander cortez and and rashida slaven l. han omar and indigenous women and latinos from texas were running and winning offices for congress so what i tell the democratic party if you want to change course and you want to get to

a place to have younger people more competitive people running you've got to start investing you've got to start believing in us when we say that we are the change we need to see in this party and to start supporting and building a bench the problem is we don't have a bench and and particularly not a bench that reflects african-american and not the you know indigenous and other marginalized communities in the united states american citizen a lot of work to do but i hope the democratic party is still going to be able to do that depending on what happens in this 2020 election more questions than answers to do with us politics i'll put my big surprise face thank you all so much for joining us today they were james pindell and us also and scott lucas and thank you too for your company you can see the show again any time by going to our web site al-jazeera dot com and for further discussion to check out our facebook page that's facebook dot com forward slash a.j. inside story you can join the conversation on twitter at a.j. inside story or tweet me i'll take you back i'm at peace at they'll be one for me for toby and the team here in doha thanks for watching i'll see you very soon but i

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