The polls are starting to close in New Hampshire in the nation’s first Democratic presidential primary of 2020, where the results could solidify Senator Bernie Sanders as the front-runner or further damage former vice president Joe Biden’s fading campaign.But surprises have been a tradition in early primaries and Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar, who had a poor showing in the Iowa caucuses, led after several of the smaller New Hampshire towns and villages began reporting results.Sanders and former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg emerged from Iowa tied for front-runner status.Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Senator Bernie Sanders speaks to the media at a polling station at the McDonough School on Election Day in the New Hampshire presidential primary election in Manchester, New Hampshire, Feb. 11, 2020.But Sanders is the self-declared democratic socialist senator from neighboring Vermont and pre-election polls showed him leading Buttigieg in New Hampshire.Senator Elizabeth Warren also hails from a neighboring state, Massachusetts, and shares many of Sanders’ progressive ideas. Some analysts are also forecasting a number of write-in votes for former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Bloomberg was not on the ballot in New Hampshire, preferring to concentrate on other states that will be up for grabs in the coming month. But Bloomberg has become a recent target of President Donald Trump’s criticism — a sign that he is starting to draw attention in a crowded field.Biden has already departed New Hampshire to campaign in South Carolina and seek support from black voters.Biden finished a poor fourth in Iowa last week after being touted as the front-runner even before he declared his candidacy.This is Biden’s third try for the White House. Despite his long experience as a senator and vice president under President Barack Obama, he has failed to stand out in a field that includes women, a democratic-socialist, billionaire entrepreneurs, a young Asian American — Andrew Yang — and the first openly gay candidate of a major party, Buttigieg.All the Democrats are claiming they are best equipped to take on Trump.”Let me start by asking you to form in your mind an image that I always ask voters to picture, because I picture it every day,” Buttigieg told his supporters at a Monday rally. “And it’s the image of what it’s going to be like the first time that the sun comes up over the mountains and lakes of New Hampshire and Donald Trump is no longer the president of the United States.”Sanders made his pitch at an early Monday rally, saying, “We are the strongest campaign to defeat Trump because of the nature of our campaign,” funded from a large network of small-dollar donors, which he contended was a sharp contrast with his rivals who have accepted contributions from wealthy donors.”Unlike some of my opponents, I don’t have contributions from the CEOs of the pharmaceutical industry or Wall Street tycoons,” Sanders said in a clear attack on Buttigieg, who has accepted such donations and says he needs them to build a national political operation.Democratic 2020 U.S. presidential candidate and U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) greets supporters outside a polling site for New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation primary in Manchester, New Hampshire, Feb. 11, 2020.Warren retooled her campaign message after a third-place finish in Iowa and urged her supporters to not “look backwards.””Our democracy hangs in the balance. So it comes to you, New Hampshire, to decide,” she said. “When there’s this much fear, when there’s this much on the line, do we crouch down? Do we cower? Do we back up? Or do we fight back? Me — I’m fighting back.”Biden argued in a Monday speech that Trump inherited a robust economy from his former boss, President Obama.Democratic 2020 U.S. presidential candidate and former Vice President Joe Biden leaves a polling station after a visit on the day of New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation primary in Manchester, New Hampshire, Feb. 11, 2020.”Trump’s going to tell us over and over again the economy is on the ballot this year,” Biden said. “It sure is. And I’m going to make sure he understands it’s on the ballot because working class and middle class people are getting clobbered. But something else is on the ballot. Character is on the ballot. The character of this country is on the ballot.”In Iowa, state Democratic officials said Buttigieg took 14 of the 41 delegates up for grabs to the party’s July national nominating convention in Milwaukee, followed by Sanders with 12, Warren with eight, Biden six and Klobuchar one.
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