SELMA, Ala. (Reuters) – Joe Biden, fresh off his first victory in the 2020 Democratic U.S. presidential race, traded barbs with front-runner Bernie Sanders on Sunday before the Super Tuesday contests that could reshape the campaign to pick the party’s challenger to Republican President Donald Trump.
Democratic U.S. presidential candidate and former Vice President Joe Biden takes photos with supporters at his South Carolina primary night rally in Columbia, South Carolina, U.S., February 29, 2020. REUTERS/Elizabeth Frantz
Strong support from African-American voters carried Biden to a resounding victory Saturday in South Carolina’s nominating contest, leading the former vice president to assert himself as a viable moderate alternative to self-described democratic socialist Sanders, an independent U.S. senator from Vermont.
Sanders’ surging campaign and calls for a political revolution have rattled a Democratic Party establishment worried that he is too far to the left to beat Trump in the Nov. 3 U.S. election. Strong performances by Sanders in the first three contests in Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada catapulted him to front-runner status.
On Sunday, Biden and Sanders portrayed themselves as the only candidate who could attract liberals, moderates and independents to defeat Trump.
“I think the Democratic Party is looking for a Democrat – not a socialist, not a former Republican, a Democrat – to be their nominee and to bring the country together in a way that I’ve been able to do my whole career,” Biden told the “Fox News Sunday” program.
Biden’s reference to a former Republican appears to have been