Trailhead

Stalking the Superdelegates

If you thought counting delegates was hard, try counting superdelegates. Scratch that don’t. Politico is doing it for you .

The project is a running tally of superdelegates, updated regularly as reports come in from news sources, readers, and the endorsers themselves. It’s a major undertaking given its specificity—you can break the endorsements down by state, type of official (party leader, governor, representative, etc.), and individual.

Clinton is ahead in the total count, with 229 superdelegates to Obama’s 138.5. (The .5 comes from overseas delegates, who count half.)

A few other juicy bits:

  • Clinton and Obama are fairly close among governors (10-10, respectively), senators (12-9), and congress members (71-58). It’s among DNC officials that Clinton really takes the lead, with 125 to Obama’s 57.5. In other words, Clinton’s sway appears to be much stronger among party hacks than among elected officials.  

  • The candidates’ home states represent the most lopsided support. In Arkansas, Clinton has all 10 committed superdelegates. She also captures 38 New York superdelegates to Obama’s zero. In Illinois, Obama has 18 to Clinton’s one.

  • Clinton has more delegates than Obama in all three “Potomac primary” jurisdictions. In Maryland, Clinton has three times as many committed superdelegates, although most of them still haven’t decided. This balance is likely to shift after today.

  • Clinton trounces Obama in California, the state with the most superdelegates, 26-11. But another 29 are still holding out.

Update 5:39 p.m.: We should mention that Democratic Convention Watch has been doing this some time already, and Politico relies partially on its numbers. Because as we’re learned, there’s no such thing as too many delegate counts.