Tuesday, September 09, 2008

Hillary's Stolen Delegates or How the DNC Stole Your Vote

Convention Vote Tally Analysis from DemConWatchConvention Vote Tally Analysis

We've gone through the numbers, and there's lots of interesting data to be looked at.

First, top line. Going into the convention, we estimated Obama at 2335 votes, (1842.5 pledged, 492.5 superdelegates), and Clinton at 1973 votes, (1720.5 pledged, 252.5 superdelegates), Edwards at 3, and 108 superdelegates uncommitted.

The results reported by the DNCC: Obama 3188.5 (+894.5), Clinton 1010.5 (-988.5), Not Voting 220 (+94 from superdelegate uncommitted). What this shows us is that at least 94 Clinton delegates abstained from voting, instead of voting for either Clinton or Obama. But it's actually more. Let's look at some key states:

CA: Was Clinton 233, Obama 200, Uncommitted 8. Convention Tally: Clinton 145 (-88) Obama 255 (+55), NV 41. At least 33 (88-55) Clinton delegates decided to abstain.

PA: Was Clinton 101, Obama 81, Uncommitted 5. Convention Tally: Clinton 20 (-81) Obama 137 (+56), NV 30. At least 25 Clinton delegates decided to abstain.

NJ: Was Clinton 71, Obama 55, Uncommitted 1. Convention Tally: Clinton 0 (-71) Obama 106 (+51), NV 21. At least 20 Clinton delegates decided to abstain.

An analysis of similar states show a total of 127 Clinton delegates (pledged and super) not voting for either candidate at the convention.

The three states above, CA, PA and NJ all had a high number of delegates not voting.

But there were only 3 other states that had 10% or more of their delegates not voting:

LA: 14 out of 67 not voting (21%), AL: 6 out of 60 not voting, MS: 4 out of 41 not voting.
Looks like early Gustav preparations for the Gulf Coast states. Fair enough.

So where did Clinton lose the most votes? Obviously in her biggest states:
NY: She lost 109 votes. CA: 88 votes. PA: 81 votes. NJ: 71 votes. OH: 59 votes. FL: 52 votes. MI: 49 votes.

In what big states did she lose a high % of her delegates?
NJ: She lost 100% of 71 delegates
PA: She lost 80% of 101 delegates
NY: She lost 59% of 185 delegates.
She also lost 100% of her delegates in AS, DE, NH, NJ, VI and VT.

Finally, there are two states that bucked these trends:

First, Iowa. Our estimate was Clinton 7, Obama 52, Uncommitted 4. Final Tally: Clinton 9, Obama 48. This is the only state where Clinton increased her numbers. Our guess is that the Green Papers estimates of Clinton's pledged delegate numbers did not reflect the fact that Clinton kept her state level delegates.

And finally, we should recognize Puerto Rico, which was the only delegation where Clinton received a majority of the delegates, 36-23.

Notes: All original Pledged Delegate numbers are from The Green Papers. All superdelegate numbers are from the DemConWatch Superdelegate Endorsement List, which was frozen on June 6th.
See Heidi Li's commentary here

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