Why the Super Delegate Scam is Political Suicide for the Washington State Democratic Party

This is a message to the leaders of the Washington State Democratic Party: If you keep ignoring hundreds of thousands of independent voters, not only will we wind up with Donald Trump for President, but we will have a Republican Governor here in Washington State! Please read this article and please wake up to the reality of current voter preferences.

Here are a few math facts. There were about 150,000 people who pre-registered for the Washington Precinct Caucuses and 35,000 surrogate affidavits. Another 45,000 just showed up bringing the total to 230,000 caucus attendees. Most people indicated that it was their first caucus ever. They elected more than 26,000 delegates to the next level which is the Legislative District caucuses. Bernie Sanders won more than 19,000 of these delegates for 73% of the total vote. This should result in Bernie also winning 73% of the delegates to the Congressional Caucuses which should lead to Bernie winning 73% of the total 101 elected delegates – or about 75 delegates to Clinton’s 26 elected delegates. Bernie Sanders won in a landslide in every county in Washington state. This was the largest margin of victory of any Presidential caucus in Washington state history.
http://www.wa-democrats.org/local/county

In addition, Washington State has 17 non-elected Super Delegates who supposedly can ignore the popular will of the people and vote for whoever they want. Ten of these super delegates have publicly supported Clinton. None so far have switched their support to Bernie Sanders despite his landslide victory on March 26th. If Clinton got all 17 Super Delegates, she would wind up with 43 delegates or 37% of the Washington delegates to the national convention even though she only got 27% of the votes at the Washington caucuses. The problem with rigging the nomination in this manner is that ignoring the will of the people is political suicide for the Washington State Democratic Party.

Here are some more math facts. Gallup polls show that since 2008, there has been a huge decline in the number of people who identify themselves as Democrats and Republicans and a dramatic rise in the number of people who identify as Independents.

If Democrats ignore this huge group of Independent voters we are likely to lose the 2016 Presidential election. All of the latest polls show Bernie Sanders is much more likely than Hillary Clinton to defeat Donald Trump. Why is it that Bernie is more likely to beat Donald Trump? The answer is that Hillary is simply not trusted. 74% of all Independent swing voters do not trust Hillary to tell the truth. This matters because Independent Voters are now 43% of all voters. They will decide who the next President will be!

A poll of more than five thousand Independent Voters by the Independent Voter Project found that Bernie Sanders had the approval of 45%, Donald Trump had 26% and Hillary Clinton only had 9%. Bernie leads Hillary 5 to 1 and Donald leads her by 3 to 1!!!
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/9/17/1422117/-Poll-of-Independents-Sanders-45-Trump-26-HRC-9

In fact, many more Americans trust Donald Trump (41%) than trust Hillary Clinton (33%). http://www.huffingtonpost.com/h-a-goodman/bernie-sanders-will-becom_b_9289066.html

But losing the Presidential election is only the beginning of our problems if leaders of the Democratic Party continue to ignore the will of Independent voters. Here in Washington State, Democrats hold a slight edge over Republicans but Independent voters hold a huge edge over either political party. Let’s assume that Washington State has 25% Republicans, 30% Democrats and 45% Independent voters. This means that at the Democratic Party Caucuses, out of the 230,000 people, about 130,000 were Independent Voters supporting Bernie and only 100,000 were actual Democrats.

Let’s further assume that 60% of actual Democrats supported Bernie and 40% supported Hillary but all of them would likely vote for either Bernie or Hillary in the General Election. This gives Hillary 40,000 Democratic votes and Bernie 60,000 Democratic votes. But Bernie beats Hillary among Independent votes by 5 to 1. Therefore, of the 130,000 Independent Voters at the caucuses, Bernie gets 110,000 Independent votes and Hillary gets 20,000. This gives Bernie a total vote of 170,000 votes and Hillary 60,000 votes. 170,000 votes just happens to be about 74% which closely matches what Bernie actually got.

These 110,000 Independent Washington Voters already think the Democratic Party is corrupt. They are only going to turn out and vote for the Democratic Party if Bernie is at the head of the ticket. So all loyal Democrats ought to be working like mad to make sure Bernie is at the head of the ticket.

But it is as important to re-elect Jay Inslee Governor as it is to elect a Democrat for President. The last thing leaders of the Democratic Party should be doing at this point is making 110,000 Independent Voters here in Washington State very, very angry. For example, here is just one of hundreds of emails I have received from Bernie supporters about the super delegate scam:

To Whom It May Concern,

The Democratic Party is playing with fire…”Super-Delegates” are an elitist and anti-democratic invention that dis-enfranchises the actual Delegates lawfully elected by their neighbors.National Democratic Party hacks are screwing with the wrong people!

That email came from a Bernie delegate elected in the 36th Legislative District. But it mirrors emails I have been getting from all across Washington state. I am getting exhausted just trying to respond to all of these emails. If you think that these 110,000 Independent Bernie supporters who took the time to show up at their precinct caucuses do not matter, then think again. Here is how the 2012 race for Governor in Washington State turned out:

Note that Jay Inslee won by only 100,000 votes in 2012. Make 110,000 Independent Swing voters mad and suddenly the Republican candidate for Governor wins by 100,000 votes and we get an anti-union Republican running our state into the ground. In fact, even if only 50,000 of these Independent Bernie votes vote for the Republican candidate for Governor, we wind up with a Republican Governor.

The real question here is why Jay Inslee and the other leaders of the Washington State Democratic Party have not figured this out. Are they nuts? Do they want to commit political suicide by making so many Independent Washington voters this angry during an election year?

Sadly, Jay Inslee and the other leaders of the Washington State Democratic Party have not figured this out. For Jay and the rest of the leaders of the Washington State Democratic Party to endorse Clinton in the first place shows that they are completely out of touch with the voters. It was only a few years ago that the Washington State Democratic Party had commanding majorities in the Washington State Senate and House. Then leaders of the Democratic Party decided to gut billions of dollars in funding for public schools and colleges in order to pay for billions of dollars in tax breaks for wealthy multinational corporations like Microsoft and Boeing. As a result, the Republican Party has already taken over the Washington State Senate and they are likely to take over the Washington State House. If leaders of the Democratic Party do not wake up, Republicans will also take over the Governor’s office in the 2016 election.

The only thing that might save the Washington State Democratic Party at this point is for Jay Inslee and every other Washington State Super Delegate to publicly and immediately switch their endorsement from Hillary Clinton to Bernie Sanders. There is a precedent for doing this. In 2008, nearly all Washington State Democratic Party leaders initially supported Hillary. But after Obama won the 2008 Washington Caucuses, nearly all of these leaders wisely switched their support to Obama. While Clinton initially had a big lead in Super Delegates in 2008, by May 2008, most of these Super Delegates switched to Obama.

Leaders of the Washington State Democratic Party should not wait until May. The voters of Washington state have already spoken. By a 3 to 1 margin, they favor Bernie Sanders. But the all important Independent Voters favor Bernie by a 5 to 1 margin. We will need these Independent voters if we are to re-elect Jay Inslee this fall.

What about the Presidential Race?
Despite the Democratic National Committee rigging the Democratic Nomination process by having all of the Southern Conservative Democratic states voting first, Clinton only has a 55% to 45% advantage over Bernie in elected delegates. Bernie is likely to win nearly all of the remaining states. Put another way, Hillary is only ahead by about 230 delegates with about 1750 delegates left to choose. We are barely half way through with the Democratic nomination process. And among the 22 Northern and Western States, we are just beginning. There are still 18 states left to vote. If Bernie wins in Wisconsin, New York, Pennsylvania and California, he will almost certainly have more elected delegates than Hillary. California alone, which will vote on June 7th, has 475 elected delegates. So Bernie could actually close the entire gap in just this single state. New York has 247 delegates and will vote on April 19th. Pennsylvania has 189 delegates and will vote on April 26th. If Bernie gets even 55% of the vote in these states, he wins the popular vote.

Even the latest national polls now show Sanders ahead of Clinton. For example, the latest Bloomberg poll taken before the landslide wins in Washington, Alaska and Hawaii, showed Sanders ahead of Clinton. Just a few months earlier, this same poll had Clinton ahead by more than 60%. So the trend is rapidly turning to Bernie.

If this trend continues, by the time the California primary gets here on June 7th, Bernie will have over 60% of the voters and will secure the votes needed for the Democratic Nomination – assuming the Super Delegates do the right thing and support the candidate who is supported by the majority of the voters.

Finally, the latest poll out of Wisconsin has Bernie Sanders ahead of Clinton 49% to 44%.
https://law.marquette.edu/poll/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/MLSP34Toplines.pdf

But what is even more revealing is that Bernie has a net favorability rating of Plus 6 while Hillary has a rating of minus 24 to the following question: Do you have a favorable or unfavorable opinion of Hillary Clinton or haven’t you heard enough about her yet?

Here is how the same group in Wisconsin thought of Bernie:

As the following question confirms, Bernie would defeat Trump in a landslide:

If the election for president were being held today and the candidates were Bernie Sanders the Democrat, and Donald Trump the Republican, for whom would you vote?

The voters also overwhelmingly favor Bernie’s call to have the wealthy pay their fair share of taxes:

In general, would you favor or oppose increasing taxes on wealthy Americans and large corporations in order to help reduce income inequality in the U.S.?

This final question confirms the huge influence of Independent Voters in the 2016 election:

Generally speaking, do you usually think of yourself as a Republican, a Democrat, or an Independent?

In the meantime, Jay Inslee is shooting himself in the foot by continuing to support Hillary Clinton even after 73% of the voters said they favor Bernie Sanders. If you read this article and you know Jay, please share it with him. The sooner Jay wakes up and supports Bernie, the more likely he is to be re-elected.

We hope you will also contact all 17 Washington State Super Delegates and ask them this important question: Are you willing to risk losing the Washington State Governors Race by offending hundreds of thousands of Independent Voters in this election year just to support Hillary Clinton? Let them know that it will be their fault if a Republican Governor is elected in Washington state this year. Here is a link to the contact information for all 17 Washington State Super Delegates.

http://washingtonforberniesanders.com/petition-to-washington-state-super-delegates

Originally published at http://washingtonforberniesanders.com/why-the-super-delegate-scam-is-political-suicide-for-the-democratic-party