President Joe Biden was projected to handily win the Democratic primary in Wisconsin on Tuesday evening, though the number of "uninstructed" voters appeared to signal material dissatisfaction with the incumbent from the party's rank-and-file.
The Associated Press called the race for Biden, who lead with 87.2% of the vote as of 9:55 p.m. time with 45.7% of precincts reporting. Minnesota Democratic Rep. Dean Phillips, who dropped out of the race last month, trailed with 2.9% while 9.8% broke for the "uninstructed" option.
Biden has already earned enough delegates to claim the party nomination and the Wisconsin contest was expected to go his way, though his margins of victory in the remaining contests are likely to signal the strength of his candidacy within his own party.
The support for the "uninstructed" ballot option was widely regarded as a gauge of internal dissent, though the figure was marginally lower than that of "uncommitted" voters in Michigan in February.
In February, he faced a sizeable contingent of protest voters in Michigan, who went for the "uncommitted" option on that ballot. The effort achieved double-digit results and was largely viewed as a statement of the state's sizeable Muslim population's defiance over the Biden administration's support for Israel amid the ongoing conflict in Gaza. Michigan Democratic Rep. Rashida Tlaib, who is of Palestinian descent, has emerged as a particularly fierce critic of the president on the issue.
Ben Whedon is an editor and reporter for Just the News. Follow him on X, formerly Twitter.
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