CNN erroneously projected Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) won Tuesday’s Mississippi Democratic primary instead of former Vice President Joe Biden.
The embarrassing error was caught by anchor Wolf Blitzer, who corrected the mistake immediately after the network put up a photo of Sanders’ face as part of its graphic projecting the winner of the Mississippi.
“We have our first projection of the night,” said Blitzer, before quickly acknowledging the awkward mix-up: “Bernie Sanders — not, not, not happening right now. Joe Biden, Joe Biden is the winner of Mississippi. There, we have it right there.”
Seconds later, the giant screen behind Blitzer turned blank before shifting to Biden as the winner.
“There we have it right — oh, can you see it? Maybe you can’t see it,” the CNN anchor told viewers after the snafu was corrected. “We’ll fix that technical problem. But the most important thing is Joe Biden is the winner, Joe Biden is the winner in Mississippi.”
Biden was also projected to win the Michigan and Missouri Democrat primaries as the polls closed on “mini” Super Tuesday.
Voters took to the polls in Idaho, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota and Washington with a combined 352 delegates are up for grabs ahead of the national convention. A week ago, Biden took over as the party front-runner after a dominating performance on Super Tuesday, when he won 10 states to Sanders’ four — including Texas.
Both candidates campaigned in Michigan on Monday, seeking to court the pivotal primary state.
Michigan is also a state that will be crucial to win in November. The state voted for Republican Donald Trump four years ago and was considered one of the key surprise victories that helped him win the presidency over Democrat Hillary Clinton.
The UPI contributed to this report.