Politics
California delegate wave didn't quite break as expected
LOS ANGELES (AP) — While Sen. Bernie Sanders mined the motherlode of delegates from California on Super Tuesday, it wasn’t nearly enough and isn’t getting counted fast enough to counter former Vice President Joe Biden’s huge night.
It became an issue of numbers and timing.
After years of being a late season player in presidential primary politics, California joined the Super Tuesday crowd, and its 415 delegates were the biggest haul on the biggest night.
But even though Sanders’ victory in California was declared quickly, it came after a series of surprising wins for Biden that dominated the earlier coverage of the primaries. And Sanders' precise delegate margin in the state won’t be known any time soon. California, with lots of early and mail-in voting, typically takes weeks to finish counting ballots. Experts expect millions are left to count.
The late-night Pacific wave that Sanders was supposed to surf to victory didn’t quite break right. His campaign declined to comment on California specifically, but top aides said before Super Tuesday that they expected far higher delegate totals than they were on pace to actually earn after voting concluded.
“Of course I’m disappointed. I would like to win every state by a landslide. It’s not going to happen," Sanders said Wednesday.
With almost two-thirds of California’s delegates allocated by The Associated Press, Sanders won about 60 more delegates in California than Biden. However, Biden won about 130 more than Sanders in the other 13 states and both got blanked in American Samoa.
“I do think Biden will come out with more delegates out of Super Tuesday,” said Louisiana State University political scientist Joshua Darr. He said late counted votes in California will help Sanders narrow Biden's win, but “it’s going to take a seismic shift then for Sanders to catch him.”
Ace Smith, a top California political consultant who had worked on Kamala Harris’ campaign, said it’s looking “pretty darn good” for Biden in California, even as Sanders is likely to walk away with more delegates.
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