US President Joe Biden wins his first Democratic presidential primary

President Joe Biden has won South Carolina’s Democratic primary on Saturday. Biden has clinched a state he was pushing to lead off his party’s nominating process after it revived his then-struggling White House bid four years ago.

Biden defeated the other long-shot Democrats on South Carolina’s ballot, including Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips and author Marianne Williamson. 

His reelection campaign invested heavily in driving up turnout in what it saw as a test drive of its efforts to mobilize Black voters, a key Democratic bloc central to Biden’s chances in a likely November rematch against former President Donald Trump.

Biden's victory comes after he led a Democratic National Committee effort to have South Carolina go first in the party’s primary, citing the state’s more racially diverse population compared to the traditional first-in-the-nation states of Iowa and New Hampshire, which are overwhelmingly white.

Biden has pushed for a revamped primary calendar that will see Nevada go second, holding its primary on Tuesday. The new order also moves the Democratic primary in Michigan, a large and diverse swing state, to Feb. 27, before the expansive field of states voting on March 5, known as Super Tuesday.