Let’s look at this pledged delegate race in three separate parts. I believe this gives us all a much better perspective of how this race is playing out.
The first part encompasses contests from Iowa through Michigan (21 contests).
The next part is Mississippi through Ohio (7 contests).
- (432 - 301) +131, Clinton
The final part is Democrats Abroad through Washington (7 contests).
Clinton was leading by +322 after Ohio. Sanders cut into that lead by 92 delegates during the last 7 contests. This left Clinton with a +230 delegate lead according to FiveThirtyEight’s tracker and still ahead of the lead she enjoyed through Michigan by +39 delegates.
I'm using FiveThirtyEight for this rough comparison, knowing that the delegate total has not exactly caught up with The Green Papers. It's roughly within 2 - 4 delegates of their numbers.
projects.fivethirtyeight.com/...
Let’s look at the last 14 contest for perspective.
It’s plain to see Sanders is making up some ground in the last 7 races (+92), but it's ground he lost in the previous 7 races (-131). Clinton has actually amassed more delegates in the last 14 contests, 519 - 490.
In regards to the argument of momentum for each candidate. Prior to this run by Sanders, Clinton swept Super Tuesday 2. If momentum were a real thing in these contests, after ST2 theoretically her results should have been much, much better in the last 7 contests. We know they weren't.
It’s much more likely that there is no real gained momentum for either candidate. Sanders, like Clinton before, has a favorable map at the moment. This will change after Wisconsin, heading to states like New York, Pennsylvania and Maryland. This will be Sanders real test and whether he can over perform in closed primaries and win these contest by roughly 13% or more.
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Another piece of interesting information. Rick Klein, from ABC, was on the Sanders campaign conference call updating the state of the race.
Tad Devine had this to say about their southern strategy:
When the Sanders campaign looks back at this race, this may be the strategy they wished they would have rethought. They gave up on 16.2% of the 4051 delegates, 652 delegates in these states alone. Clinton netted +266 delegates in these states.
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For those who haven't seen it yet, here's the fun Democratic Delegate Calculator to work your own projections in the remaining races. www.demrace.com