Amy Klobuchar Drops Out of 2020 Presidential Race
Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Amy Klobuchar is suspending her campaign for President following two sixth place finishes in Nevada and South Carolina and a surprise third place result in the New Hampshire primary.
The Minnesota Senator’s campaign confirmed to ABC News that she is flying to Dallas today to join Joe Biden at his Monday night rally where she’ll endorse the former vice president.
Hours prior to her poor finish in South Carolina, Klobuchar told reporters that her campaign had been approaching the race via a “state by state” strategy because of the lack of funding.
“I will say, you know, South Carolina for me, the issue was we got a lot of our funding in after New Hampshire,” she said. “And while we had operations and staff in South Carolina and for that matter, in Nevada, we didn't have as big of a staff there as some of the other campaigns. Why? Because we didn't have the funding and we've been basically going state by state.”
Klobuchar had been running a more moderate campaign and opposed programs like “Medicare for All” populrized by her former opponent, Sen. Bernie Sanders. In the end, she was unable to carve out enough of the non-white vote to keep her campaign viable.
In South Carolina, polls leading up to the early voting state showed she had zero percent support from African American voters, and after the votes had been tallied, Klobuchar garnered only one percent of the Black vote.
Her campaign tended to fare better in mostly white states like Iowa and New Hampshire, where she finished fifth and third, respectively.
In all, Klobuchar finished in sixth place, behind every other candidate still on the debate stage, receiving around 3 percent of the total vote.
In South Carolina, candidates needed to earn at least 15 percent of the vote to receive delegates. Only Joe Biden (48 percent) and Bernie Sanders (20 percent) won delegates.
On Sunday, Klobuchar was forced to cancel a rally in her home state after a number of Black Lives Matter protestors showed up and began chanting, "Free Myron." This was in recognition of the Black teen convicted of murder while Klobuchar was a prosecutor. It is said that there is evidence that the police botched the investigation that lead to Myron Burrell's life in prison conviction for the 2002 murder of a Black girl who was shot while doing her homework at home.
Klobuchar had been asked several times how she intended to win over support from Black voters. Earlier this year at a donor event, Klobuchar said, “African American women have turned out every single time for Democratic candidates. They need some friends. They need some support. And so when I look at this, I look at independents, and I look at moderate Republicans to add to our numbers.”
The remaining candidates will pivot to Super Tuesday where Bernie Sanders has a commanding lead in the polls in the day’s two biggest races – California and Texas.
Klobuchar’s native Minnesota is also on the ballot tomorrow.