Cook Political Report: Clinton could effectively clinch the race in a week's time (HRC Group)

[Godhumor]

Cross-posted from GDP:

In the aftermath of Iowa, New Hampshire, and Nevada, Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders are technically tied at 51 pledged delegates apiece. But that vastly understates the magnitude of Sanders's challenge between now and June. In fact, if Clinton performs as well on Super Tuesday (March 1) as her polling and results thus far suggest she will do, she could effectively clinch the Democratic nomination race in a week's time.

Unlike on the Republican side, about 15 percent of DNC delegates are unpledged "superdelegates" - a total of 712 elected officials and party leaders - who can support whomever they want at the convention. According to the Associated Press, Clinton currently leads Sanders 449 to 19 among this group, for an overall delegate lead of 500 to 70.

...


And, if Clinton were to claim a delegate lead of 996 to 492 out of Super Tuesday, that would mean Sanders would need to win 58 percent of the remaining delegates available just to break even. That would be nearly impossible, because unlike on the Republican side, there are no "winner-take-all" Democratic primaries at any point on the calendar. Moreover, demographically and ideologically, two of Sanders's best states - Iowa and New Hampshire - have already voted.

In short, it could very quickly become mathematically implausible for Sanders to come back from a large delegate deficit, and barring any major unexpected events, all signs point to Clinton being well "on pace" to secure the Democratic nomination.

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http://cookpolitical.com/story/9274

Also of note, Cook estimates Clinton performing at 124% of her targets to become nominee versus just 82% for Sanders.

[Chichiri]

1. I love Cook, but I wish they'd do a superdelegate-less version of the scorecard.

It's almost certain that the majority of superdelegates will end up supporting the pledged delegate victor.

[6chars]

3. Yeah, she seems to be in the catbird's seat even without them

[leftofcool]

9. I don't think so this time. They DO NOT want Bernie

[workinclasszero]

2. In a weeks time yall!!!!!

[Rose Siding]

4. He's so establishment

[Tarheel_Dem]

5. Don't know why, but this makes me smile.

[pandr32]

6. And what a relief it will be!

Time to concentrate on naming a running mate and beginning to set the ground for the GE against the billionaire carnival barker or the junior robot who will have all his programmers safely out of view.

[DesertRat]

7. It can't come soon enough

[fleabiscuit]

8. +1

[George II]

10. I'm not as optimistic as they are, but Clinton could conceivably get about 550 to 300 or so...

...on Tuesday.

If she does that, added to her current 52 delegates and expected 30+ on Saturday, she will have about 910-930 delegates to Sanders' 380-400 delegates.

That would be roughly 500 more than Sanders with about 1/4 of the pledged delegates selected. With only 2750 left to be selected, Sanders would need more than 1600 of those to catch up to Clinton. So he would need 59% of the remaining 2750 pledged delegates to catch up, and THEN he'll need to get 51% of the superdelegates. That isn't going to happen because Clinton already has more than 60% of the superdelegates.

The important result of the votes on Super Tuesday is that with her expected lead by March 2, superdelegates will not be the factor that some people are complaining about.

I guess this is why the bookmakers have Clinton with a 90% chance of winning the nomination.