President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump swept to victory in statewide nominating contests across the country on Tuesday, setting up a historic rematch in November's general election despite low approval ratings for both candidates.

Trump won the Republican votes in a dozen states - including delegate-rich California and Texas - brushing aside former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, his lone remaining rival, who no longer has a viable path to the nomination. Her only win of the night thus far came in Vermont, Edison Research projected.

After a commanding performance across 15 states where more than one-third of Republican delegates were up for grabs on Super Tuesday, Trump had all but clinched his third consecutive presidential nomination, despite facing a litany of criminal charges.

Biden had been expected to sail through the Democratic contests, though a protest vote in Minnesota organized by activists opposed to his forceful support of Israel attracted unexpectedly strong results.

The "uncommitted" vote in Minnesota stood at nearly 20 percent with more than half the estimated vote counted, according to Edison, higher even than the 13 percent that a similar effort in Michigan drew last week. 

Biden nevertheless won Minnesota and 14 other states, including a mail-in vote in Iowa that ended on Tuesday.

He did suffer one loss, in the U.S. territory of American Samoa's caucus, where entrepreneur Jason Palmer won 51 votes to Biden's 40, according to the American Samoa Democratic Party.

(Cover: "I Voted" stickers sit on a table at a polling station in Nashville, Tennessee, March 5,2024. /CFP)