Biden and Trump protest votes failed to gain traction as they clinched nominations
The "uncommitted" campaign against Biden had less success Tuesday than before.
President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump were able to easily become their parties' 2024 nominees on Tuesday night, as few anti-Trump or anti-Biden "uncommitted" votes gained traction in the last states to cast ballots before both candidates clinched.
Biden crossed the threshold to become the presumptive Democratic nominee after polls closed in Georgia, one of the five states and territories that cast votes on Tuesday.
But political observers were keenly watching a place where election results were reported later in the night: Washington. Efforts had gained some notice there to encourage voters to choose the uncommitted option on the ballot, instead of Biden, in protest of his stance on the Israel-Hamas war.
However, with 71% of the expected votes reported, uncommitted was at 8% (or about 58,000 ballots) -- and looked likely to fall short of winning any delegates to the Democratic National Convention, even as mobilization for the campaign had ramped up in recent weeks and gained some significant local endorsements. By comparison, Biden got more than 600,000 votes.
Uncommitted has been more successful elsewhere, breaking 15% in Minnesota and being estimated to have earned delegates there and in Hawaii and Michigan, the latter being a key swing state for both Biden and Trump.
Trump, meanwhile, became the presumptive Republican nominee on Tuesday after results from Washington were reported. Like Biden, he was the sole major candidate running in his party as his final challenger and the last chance of an anti-Trump candidate, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, suspended her bid last week.
But Haley did earn some share of votes on Tuesday, particularly in Washington and Georgia, though it's possible many of those ballots were cast during the states' early vote periods ahead of her campaign's suspension on March 6.
It is unclear just how much of the support for Haley reported on Tuesday was from a coalition who continues to object to the former president.
Haley has argued that the votes she won against Trump in the early states in the nominating race, breaking 40% in some places, prove he can't win in a general election, though the history of contested primaries suggests otherwise.
How large was the anti-Trump vote?
Early voting in Georgia started on Feb. 19 and ran through Friday, while absentee ballots were available starting on Feb. 12.
As of Sunday, about 271,000 votes had been cast early in Georgia's Republican presidential primary and it is unclear how many early votes came in by March 5, the day before Haley ended her campaign.
The Georgia secretary of state's office did not immediately reply to ABC News' request for that information.
According to the secretary of state's current results, around 19,800 votes were cast for Haley on Election Day (about 3% of the total Republican primary votes), while around 53,000 were cast for her early and around 4,200 were cast for her by mail -- or slightly less than 10% of all GOP ballots.
With 97% of the expected vote reporting as of Wednesday night, Haley received 13% of the vote, or more than 77,000 votes in the Georgia primary compared to Trump's 497,000.
She received even more votes in Washington which used universal mail ballots starting on Feb. 23.
Overall, with 72% of the expected vote reporting as of Wednesday night, Haley received 21% of the vote, or around 135,000 votes in the Washington primary compared to Trump's 481,000.
There were around 402,000 GOP ballots returned in Washington during the time period between Feb. 23 and March 5, the day before Haley left the race, according to current results from the Washington secretary of state. It's unclear how many of those were for her or Trump.
Haley did the worst in Mississippi's primary and Hawaii's caucuses, getting about 13,000 votes in the former (with 89% of expected ballots reported) and 58 votes in the latter (with 84% of expected ballots reported). That compares with some 225,000 in Mississippi and 3,500 in Hawaii for Trump.
How big was uncommitted in Washington?
Organizers of the latest uncommitted campaign against Biden billed their results from Washington as a victory despite their expected inability to gather any delegates.
"Our grassroots, Palestinian- and Muslim-led, multi-racial, multi-faith, anti-war movement of Democratic voters uncommitted to Biden's funding of war in Gaza emerged victorious tonight," Uncommitted WA lead organizer and spokesperson Rami Al-Kabra said in a statement.
He added that the goal had been 12,000 votes, about double what the option got in 2020.
In Washington, with about 72% of the expected vote reporting by Wednesday night, uncommitted was at around 58,000 votes.
Biden has earned 88 of the state's 92 delegates, according to ABC News estimates, with four delegates remaining unallocated so far.
The push to choose the uncommitted option, which is not available in every state, began in Michigan in February. The movement received around 101,000 votes and won two delegates in Michigan, according to ABC News' count and estimates.
In the weeks since, nearly 46,000 uncommitted votes were cast in Minnesota and earned about 29% of the vote in Hawaii -- enough to also be estimated to send uncommitted delegates to the Democrats' convention in August, where the nominee is officially chosen.
The efforts are next expected to expand in Wisconsin for its April 2 primary, where an advocacy group is urging Democrats to vote "uninstructed."
ABC News' Juhi Doshi, Lalee Ibssa and Oren Oppenheim contributed to this report.
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