Tomorrow, we will make our predictions for Saturday’s Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico’s races on Sunday. These contests should provide Hillary Clinton roughly 45 more delegates. This is where things get very interesting. Estimates of the number of delegates she still needs for the nomination range from 70-90 give or a take a delegate. With the 45 or so won by Sunday, Clinton will need at most another 50 delegates to have the majority sewn up. We are absolutely certain that she already has these delegates because there are still something like “150” undecided super delegates. The odds that Clinton has 50 or so who just have not yet gone public is almost certain. This is why the Media will almost certainly declare Hillary Clinton the presumptive nominee when polls close in New Jersey. New Jersey has 126 delegates, and just half of those (63) delegates, combined with the delegates from the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico, will easily put her over the top. It is also true that on Puerto Rico day, the Clinton camp will have the delegates and a victory to make it seem as if it was not just super delegates that put her over the top. So the question deserves to be asked. Can Clinton convince the Media to declare her the victor on Sunday? Should she try? Will that help her in the voting on Tuesday or would it provoke a backlash by voters who feel like they are being denied their choice? It is a very interesting question. We may never learn the answer because the Clinton campaign would definitely need to try for this to happen, and they probably won’t. While there is renewed drama about California, it is important to remember Clinton could choose Sunday instead to end the race. She is choosing not to claim victory out of respect for the voters and Sanders supporters. This is a not required; this is a choice. We are not so sure it’s the right one.
The Scorecard
The Scorecard is a political strategy and analysis blog. Our hope is to provide information and insight that can be found nowhere else into how and why things are happening in American politics. Unlike many political pundits, we will tell you who we think is going to win as an election approaches; we will tell you why; and we will give you a sense of our level of confidence. Ours is a holistic approach, one that takes in as many numbers as possible but is also willing to look past the numbers if need be. When we turn out to have been wrong, we will let you know. When we are right, we’ll let you know that too.
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About Me
Author Jason Paul is a longtime political operative who got his start as an intern in 2002. He has been a political forecaster for almost as long. He won the 2006 Swing State Project election prediction contest and has won two other local contests. He had the pulse of Obama-Clinton race in 2008 and has been as good as anyone at delegate math in the 2016 race. He looks forwards to providing quality coverage for the remainder of the 2016 race.
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