DENVER – Who should walk away with more national delegates after the Colorado Democratic state convention Saturday in Loveland?
The answer is largely a matter of perspective, depending on whether you stand with Bernie Sanders or Hillary Clinton.
On March 1, Sanders won 59 percent of the caucus vote, after an at times chaotic nominating process that saw heated exchanges between Clinton and Sanders supporters. Clinton took 40 percent.
Those new to the process assumed that meant Sanders would be awarded about 60 percent of the state’s delegates.
In reality, Sanders may end up with a slight edge over Clinton, or he could just break even with her. There’s even a scenario where he loses to Clinton.
“If she (Clinton) ends up prevailing at the state convention, I think we’re going to have some serious problems,” said state Rep. Joe Salazar, D-Thornton, one of Sanders’ most outspoken supporters in Colorado. “She’s going to have problems as a candidate to woo people over who will then think that the system was rigged.
“Generally speaking, people will be completely disenfranchised from the process leading up to November,” he said.
Colorado will send 78 delegates to the Democratic National Convention.
Forty-three are elected at congressional districts. Out of the four districts that have elected delegates, Sanders has a 16-11 lead over Clinton.
The remaining three congressional districts were scheduled to elect delegates Friday night at assemblies, including the 3rd Congressional District, which includes La Plata County.
Another 14 at-large delegates will be elected at the state convention Saturday, as well as an additional nine who are party leaders and elected officers.
Where things get controversial is with the remaining 12 superdelegates, who are unpledged high-ranking officials, such as Gov. John Hickenlooper and members of Congress.
Most of those superdelegates are expected to support Clinton, though at least two are undecided. If Sanders lands even one superdelegate, there’s a solid chance he could walk away with an edge over Clinton, though it would not be the nearly 60 percent represented on Super Tuesday.
Adding to uncertainty is a looming spring snowstorm. The Sanders campaign has largely relied on high turnout, so if delegates don’t show because of the storm, results could be skewed.
La Plata County is sending a committee of 48 delegates to Loveland this weekend.
“Enthusiasm is very high,” said Jean Walter, chairwoman of the La Plata County Democratic Party. “Both the Sanders and the Clinton delegates are ready to roll and keep their support going.”
Sanders has a lead in the county delegation of 30-18.
“I feel confident that all of those are sticking with their original support,” Walter said.
She added that there is frustration among delegates over the multistep nominating process that can at times shut out average voters.
“The process is so arcane, it’s difficult to understand, it confuses one thing with another,” Walter said. “People are frustrated by the ins and outs. It’s not an attempt to exclude anyone, even though that outcome is what happened.”
Calls to switch to a primary system were renewed this week, after The Denver Post reported that Sanders won an additional delegate above the first projections after the Colorado Democratic Party admitted to a reporting error. The party failed to inform the public of the error, even though it discovered the discrepancy a week after the March 1 caucus.
“We sincerely apologize for this confusion it has caused around the caucus process and any changes that affect the estimation of national delegates allocated in the state of Colorado,” Rick Palacio, chairman of the Colorado Democratic Party, said in a statement.
For his part, Hickenlooper defended the caucus and delegate process.
“It was intended to balance out the system,” the governor said. “It’s not rigged.
“Because you have a caucus that such far, far fewer number of people are going to participate in ... if there were a populist person rising up, they wanted to make sure that the people who had been involved in the political process for a longer period of time would have some influence on the ultimate distribution of delegates,” he said.
Colorado House Speaker Dickey Lee Hullinghorst, a national delegate for Clinton from the 2nd Congressional District, suggested that Sanders supporters should have paid closer attention to the process.
“I don’t consider it unfair. You’ve got to be a part of the process here ...” Hullinghorst said. “If you don’t have the delegates to reflect your proportion, it’s not anybody else’s fault but yours.”
Salazar said Sanders supporters have certainly been engaged within the system. But he worries about “shenanigans” within the process.
“The way that the system is set up doesn’t necessarily reflect, in terms of the delegate counts, exactly how we feel,” Salazar said. “That’s the most infuriating thing about it.”
pmarcus@durangoherald.com
