New York Scraps State Primary Due to Uncontested Races

(Bloomberg) -- New York is canceling its primary because none of the races on the June 23 ballot are contested.

The cancellation comes after at least a dozen states, including New York, postponed their primaries or moved to mail-in-only voting because of the coronavirus pandemic.

New York is the first state to cancel its primary altogether.

The state Board of Elections on Monday removed candidates who are no longer seeking the presidency.

Democratic candidate Joe Biden has virtually sewn up the presidential nomination as the last of his rivals, Bernie Sanders, dropped out earlier this month.

The state was initially slated to hold its primary on April 28 that but was postponed until June 23 by Governor Andrew Cuomo in late March.

New York state sends 320 delegates to the Democratic nominating convention. David Bergstein, a spokesman for the Democratic National Committee, said New York’s allocation of delegates will need to be approved by the party.

“Any substantive change to a state’s first determining step in allocating delegates like this one will need to be reviewed by the DNC’s Rules and By-Laws Committee,” Bergstein said. “Once the state party submits an updated selection plan on how they plan on allocating delegates, the committee will look at that plan and make a determination.”

New York has been the state hardest hit in the U.S. by Covid-19 with 288,045 confirmed cases as of Monday and 22,376 deaths -- triple that of New Jersey, the state which has seen the second most fatalities and cases.

At least 10 people in Wisconsin contracted the virus after voting in the state’s primary election earlier this month that was held despite attempts to postpone it by the governor.

The Associated Press first reported the cancellation.

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