Primed for the March 10 Primaries
By John Sharp
Missouri’s presidential preference primary election will be on Tuesday, March 10, and five political parties have presidential candidates on the ballot.
Almost all the attention in this election has focused on the Democratic primary where there were 22 candidates on the ballot, many of whom by now have dropped out, the latest being billionaire activist Tom Steyer who dropped out February 29, former South Bend, Indiana, mayor Pete Buttigieg who dropped out March 1 and U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar who dropped out March 2, Michael Bloomberg March 4 and Elizabeth Warren on March 5 . Both Buttigieg, Klobuchar and Bloomberg have endorsed former Vice President and U.S. Senator Joe Biden.
A total of 15 states and territories that have about a third of the Democratic delegates held their presidential primaries on Tuesday, March 3, and the results of the so-called “Super Tuesday” primaries narrowed the field to Biden, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders and Tulsi Gabbard before Missouri’s election. Tulsi Gabbard has served as a US congresswoman from Hawaii’s second district since 2013.
While I’ve never even heard of some of the Democratic candidates and have only met three – U.S. Senator and former Newark, NJ, mayor Cory Booker, former Housing & Urban Development secretary and former San Antonio mayor Julian Castro and U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, as the date of our primary nears I had begun to get expensive and well done mailings from billionaire former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg.
I also had gotten mailings from Biden and U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren.
I continue to get numerous text messages every day from Sanders’ campaign asking for small donations. He appears to be running as close to a true grassroots campaign as it is possible to run for the presidency.
In the Republican primary there are four candidates on the ballot besides President Donald Trump. Two are almost totally unknown, and another (a former one-term U.S. Representative from Illinois) has dropped out. Bill Weld, a former two-term governor of Massachusetts, is the only candidate facing the President with significant political and governmental experience.
There is one presidential candidate Jacob Hornburger on the Libertarian Party primary ballot. Hornberger is an attorney, author, and politician from Texas. He is the founder and president of the Future of Freedom Foundation.
There are three on the Green Party ballot: Green Party co-founder Howie Hawkins, international environmental attorney Dario David Hunter, and activist David Rolde.
There are two on the Constitution Party ballot: former coal executive Don Blankenship and chiropractor Don Grundmann.