Only 20 to go after Puerto Rico!

Puerto Rico goes 38-17. And Obama got two new supers today. The number of delegates needed to win the nomination is 2117. Obama has 2071 in the bank. He is guaranteed a minimum 17 pledged delegates in MT and SD, plus 9 more superdelegates that have said they will endorse him by June 4 (Jim Clyburn, Margie Campbell, Deb Kozikowski, plus the 6 Pelosi Club members: President Carter, Nancy and Christine Pelosi, Chris van Hollen, Denise Johnson, and Maria Cantwell).

So that leaves only 20 additional delegates for Obama to win. That can come from other superdelegates, from doing better in MT and SD, and from the 13.5 Edwards delegates.

MSNBC was speculating that Obama will already have lined up just barely enough supers prior to Tuesday night, so that the final delegates awarded in MT and SD will throw him over the total amount needed. Sounds good to me.

New Delegate Math based on Today's RBC Meeting!

Following the Democratic Party Rules and Bylaws Committee Meeting today, I have updated the delegate math based on their decisions. The new number of delegates needed to win the nomination is 2117. Obama has 2052 in the bank, and he is guaranteed a bare minimum of 32 pledged delegates based on the allocation rules of the last 3 primaries, plus 8 more superdelegates that have said they will endorse him in June. So that leaves only 25 additional delegates for Obama to win. That can come from other superdelegates, from doing better than the bare minimum in PR, MT and SD, and from the 13.5 Edwards delegates.




I predict Obama will bring it all home on Tuesday night in Montana. Then it's on to the general.

Obama needs only 2 more delegates to win! Tomorrow?

Actually he needs 1.5 but because all the Democrats Abroad delegates (who only have half-votes) have spoken, it will take two whole people. Today we learn via DemConWatch that Obama snagged 4 superdelegate endorsements to Clinton's 1. One of them, DNC member Betty Richie of Texas, is a Pelosi Club member, so the count of undeclared Pelosi Club members drops to 5 (Nancy and Christine Pelosi, Jimmy Carter, Chris van Hollen, and Denise Johnson).

So here is how the math adds up right now:





The math closely aligns with the methodology used in the great diaries at DailyKos by PocketNines, most recently here. If you have a concern about how the guaranteed future delegate count is arrived at, PocketNines offers a full explanation.

I use DemConWatch as my main source (as does DailyKos), and DemConWatch uses The Green Papers as its source. For Hillary's superdelegate number, I use the number reported by the Obama results website. The campaign has its finger on the pulse and often shows a few more supers committed to Hillary than DCW does.

The gray and sky-blue shaded cells are for manual input. The values in the gray cells can change but do so infrequently. The values in the blue-shaded cells are the ones that change most often and which I check daily.

Regarding the differences from the Obama website:

I am already counting Donna Edwards as a superdelegate for Obama. She is a lock to win the special election in Maryland on June 17, at which time she becomes a super. She has already endorsed Obama.

I am counting the two pledged Clinton delegates from Maryland and DC who switched to Obama. I agree they are jerks, however, a vote is a vote.

Texas: Here is my diary on the Texas caucus delegate situation from last week. This will be resolved at the state convention on June 7.

Louisiana: Here is a comment I made on another previous diary of mine. Obama's site is wrong. Louisiana has named actual live breathing people for all its delegate slots, so that should settle it.

Comments and suggestions accepted. Can you believe we do this for fun?