Bernie Sanders stayed alive on Saturday, but it will take a dramatic reversal of political fortunes for him to overtake Hillary Clinton.

Sanders scored wins in the Kansas and Nebraska caucuses, riding support among the state’s largely white electorates to win by a comfortable margin in both states. But Clinton won overwhelmingly in Louisiana, with Sanders again unable to compete in a state with a large bloc of non-white voters.


The problem with a draw for Sanders, however, is that he started Saturday in a deep hole to Clinton, having secured 432 delegates to her 1,066. It takes 2,383 delegates to win the Democratic nomination. On Saturday, 109 delegates were up for grabs, and given Clinton’s projected margin of victory in Louisiana, she and Sanders will take home similar shares of that total.

Sanders could score another win when Democrats caucus in Maine on Sunday, but all those little wins won’t be enough for Sanders unless he starts getting results in larger, more diverse states. A big test comes on Tuesday in Michigan, when Democrats hold a primary with 147 delegates at stake.

Speaking at a rally in Warren, Michigan on Saturday, Sanders pleaded with supporters to help him turn to the tide. "On Tuesday Michigan has an enormously important primary,” he said. “We will win that primary if voter turnout is high. Let's make it high turnout. Thank you."

Sanders on Saturday evening also hit Clinton over her use of super PACs, her ties to Wall Street and her refusal to release the transcripts of paid speeches — a preview of the attacks he’ll likely use during the Sunday night debate in Flint, Michigan.

In Kansas on Saturday, Sanders crushed Clinton, taking 68 percent of the vote to Clinton’s 32 percent. In Nebraska, with almost 80 percent of votes recorded, Sanders had claimed about 55 percent of the vote to Clinton’s 45 percent.

Louisiana is where Clinton won and won big on Saturday, leading Sanders by almost 50 percentage points with almost 80 percent of precincts reporting. It’s another in a string of Southern wins for Clinton, who dominated in the region on Super Tuesday and won big in South Carolina a week ago.

Sanders’ refusal to drop out of the contest, even with a dramatically narrowing path to the nomination, is a nuisance for Clinton, who is eager to put the primary contest in the rearview mirror and focus on the general election.



"We have to win this election and we all know the stakes keep getting higher and the rhetoric you're hearing from the other side keeps sinking lower," Clinton said during a Democratic fundraiser in Detroit. "I want to congratulate Senator Sanders for running a strong campaign, I am thrilled we are adding to our pledged delegate count I’m grateful to everyone who turned out to support us."



"Now all eyes turn to Michigan," she added.

But there are still risks lurking for Clinton, namely the email scandal that she hasn’t been able to shake. Her choice to exclusively use a private email account and server during her four years as secretary of state has damaged the perceptions of her trustworthiness. And she could be interviewed in the coming weeks by the FBI, which is investigating her unusual email setup.



For Sanders, though, the electoral map will look increasingly bleak unless he is able to rack up a series of big wins between now and March 15.



While the self-described democratic socialist has stunned with the political movement he has sparked, he has yet to prove that he can appeal across demographic lines. He performed strongly in New England, delivering big wins in Vermont and New Hampshire, and narrowly losing in Massachusetts.

Regardless of where Sanders finishes in the race, he’ll have left his mark: His message attacking income inequality has forced Clinton to move to the left in her approach to corporate America and Wall Street more specifically.



He’ll get a chance to push his populist themes on Sunday night during the Democratic debate in Flint, a town both candidates have aggressively courted as it tries to recover from a devastating water crisis that has harmed its largely African-American population.

Daniel Strauss and Eliza Collins contributed to this report.