By Brandon Moseley
Alabama Political Reporter
On Saturday, April 9, US Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) won the Wyoming Democratic Caucuses. Sanders has now won 8 of the last 9 Democratic contests but still trails former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (D) in delegates headed into the New York state Democratic Primary.
Sen. Sanders said in a statement to supporters, “We just got word that we won Wyoming’s caucus. This is huge. This momentum is just what we need in order to win New York’s crucial primary in 10 days. But we also must know that the billionaire class is more scared than ever, and they don’t want to see us win again. They want to stop us here and now.”
Sen. Sanders said that, “We can keep our momentum going with another huge victory in New York. Your investment today in our movement will go a long way to taking back our country from the billionaire class. Momentum is winning eight out of the last nine contests while bringing more and more voters and young people to our side as we talk about income inequality, climate change, universal health care, and our corrupt campaign finance system. Momentum is proving again and again to the political and economic establishment that you don’t need to have a super PAC in order to win the presidency.”
Sanders, who outraised Clinton in both March and February, said, “This momentum is incredible – but you’ll never imagine what our momentum can be if we win New York’s primary.”
Sen. Sanders has struggled with Black and Latino voters, why Hillary Clinton was able to sweep the deep South and amass a big delegate lead. Sanders is winning White Democrats, often by huge margins and is totally dominating the young Democrats demographic. For Sanders, who grew up in Brooklyn, beating Clinton in her adopted home state of New York, will be a challenge because New York is much more ethnically diverse than the states he has been dominating.
Clinton leads Sanders 1756 to 1068 according to the Associated Press; but leads Sanders by only 1287 to 1037 in the actual won delegates. Sec. Clinton has more pledged super delegates; powerful Democratic Party officials, office holders, and functionaries who have voting rights at the convention. The super delegates are not actually bound to their pledged candidate.
To win the nomination Sanders not only has to win most of the remaining states he also has to convince enough of the super delegates to reach the 2383 votes needed to win. If the FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton’s handling of classified documents while Secretary of State should lead to fear or even an actual indictment the super delegates have the power to reject Hillary (who can’t reach 2383 without them) even if she has the most delegates coming in to the convention. They don’t have to necessarily give the nomination though to Bernie Sanders. Once no candidate gets 2383 on the first ballot the delegates all become unbound and could select someone else to be the nominee.
