Massachusetts as a window into the Democratic primary process.

           Tuesday’s results in New Hampshire showed that this race might be more interesting than was initially anticipated. Hillary Clinton was only 1% off her winning vote percentage in 2008. Still losing is obviously worse than holding, and 2008 was a three-way as opposed to two-way race. She should have picked up more than she did.  No doubt about it, it was a bad result for the Clinton campaign.

We are through two states. Although Clinton is struggling, things have to get worse for her for Sanders to win.  What is important to recognize is how fast things will move and how little time the Sanders campaign has before the door, that now seems wide open, can slam shut.

From a traditional press perspective, the race now moves to Nevada and South Carolina, which are obviously important states. Momentum can matter. Yet, what may be the even more important deadline is also rapidly approaching. In just 18 days, we get the first real delegate bonanza: 11 states and one territory vote on March 1^st with 865 delegates. To judge this race, it is important to digest this chart. http://cookpolitical.com/story/9179   This shows what Sanders needs to win state-by-state. Despite what seems like a painful result in the first two states, Clinton is in fact already running 10 delegates ahead of where she need to be. Significantly, this chart does not take into account super delegates, which is a discussion for another time, and ignores what would seem to be her strengths in territories, particularly the Island of Puerto Rico. Rather than go through all 12 contests, let’s take a close look at just one, Massachusetts. Cook says Sanders need to win 53 of the 91 delegates at stake in the Commonwealth.

 Massachusetts was one of Hillary Clinton’s 2008 surprise best states. Despite the fact both Senators and the Governor endorsed Obama, Clinton won, delivering a sweeping 15% margin. For Sanders to keep to this chart’s pace for delegate accumulation, it seems likely he would need to win Massachusetts this time by the same margin. To get the net 15 delegates Cook says he needs, Sanders in fact might need to do a bit better. Massachusetts has five seven-delegate districts and four six-delegate districts. To avoid a tie in terms of delegates in the seven-delegate districts, Sanders would need 64% of the vote. That’s his cracking number, as it’s called, and it’s incredibly hard to achieve.

Thus, even if he wins all five districts by huge, but not huge enough margins, he will net only five delegates. There are two different types of statewide delegates: Party Leader/Elected Officials have 12, and regular at large have 20. In the 12 bucket, a 7-5 split is possible. Getting above that requires 62.5% of the vote statewide, which seems almost impossible. Sanders did not reach that in New Hampshire. There are 20 regular statewide at-large delegates, which could be divided 12 to 8, though that would require a difficult but reachable 57.5% of the vote.  Still, even with 57.5% of the statewide vote and a victory in all five odd numbered Congressional districts, that still nets only 11 (5 + 2 + 4) of the 15 delegates he seemingly needs. Sanders also needs to crack two of the four six-delegate Congressional districts to get to his 15 Delegates. (58.33% is needed to crack a six-delegate district.) There is an outside chance to get 64% in one of the seven-delegate districts but clearly only one district has such potential. 

This seems like an exceptionally difficult challenge, made all the more so by some of the warning signs in the New Hampshire exit poll data. Sanders’ margin in New Hampshire was driven by a fantastic number with under 30s, who made up 19% of the vote. This high percentage of young people was aided by same day voter registration, which Massachusetts does not have. In fact, the voter registration deadline for Massachusetts was yesterday. In New Hampshire on Tuesday, under 30s outvoted over-65s.  But in Massachusetts in 2008, over 60 was 30% of the vote versus only 14% for under 30. Another big difference between voting in the two states is over party affiliation. Among self-identified Democrats, Sanders was only able to win by a narrow four points in New Hampshire. Democrats were only 58% of the vote, while Independents made up 40% of Democratic primary votes. In Massachusetts in 2008, the Democratic number was 65% versus 33% for Independents. The non-white percentage of the electorate also doubles in Massachusetts. These differences alone likely shrink the margin for Sanders number below what is needed to hit the Cook number.  

I’ll present an actual preview for Super Tuesday with predictions at a later date. This is a good place to start when thinking about this race. Clinton needs to bleed even more than she did in Iowa and New Hampshire for Sanders to win.