politics: Who's winning, who's losing, and why.

Slate's Delegate CalculatorObama now looking at 11-delegate pickup from Tuesday.

By Chadwick Matlin and Chris Wilson
Updated Sunday, May 11, 2008, at 6:22 AM ET
Illustration by Mark Alan Stamaty. Click image to expand.

With most of the delegates from Tuesday's primaries in North Carolina and Indiana counted, the damage for Hillary Clinton has shrunk. On Wednesday, it appeared that Barack Obama was on track for a 15-delegate pickup, with a 17-delegate lead in North Carolina and a two-delegate deficit in Indiana. Now, it appears his 14-point victory in North Carolina will award him 65 pledged delegates to Hillary Clinton's 50 while Clinton's two-point win in Indiana will give her 38 pledged delegates to Obama's 34. That's a net gain of 11.

With this adjustment, Obama now leads Clinton by 165 pledged delegates. This correction in Clinton's favor isn't too surprising. As we've noted before, the district-by-district numbers tend to err in favor of the loser compared to estimates based on the popular vote.

Methodology

  • The current number of pledged delegates comes from NBC News' tally. The delegate count prior to March 4 includes the 14 pledged delegates from the Democrats Abroad Global Primary and subsequent convention, who count for half as much as their domestic counterparts'.
  • We estimate the number of delegates based on the overall state vote, even though delegates are awarded by congressional district as well. We felt comfortable making this approximation because in the primaries through Mississippi, there was only a 2.9 percent deviation between the percentage of the overall vote and the percentage of delegates awarded in primaries. The proportion of delegates awarded by congressional district, therefore, does not differ greatly from the statewide breakdown.
  • The calculator now includes options to enable Florida and Michigan. When you check the boxes next to either or both states, you'll notice that the overall number of delegates needed for the nomination changes. With Florida and/or Michigan involved, there are more total delegates to go around, so the number needed for a majority rises. Our calculator assumes that the DNC will allow both states to retain their entire pledged delegation, and not punish the states by halving their delegate totals like the RNC did.
  • The calculator does not incorporate superdelegates into its calculations. Superdelegates are unpledged and uncommitted and therefore can change their endorsements and convention votes at any time. As a result, we've simply noted at the bottom of the calculator how many superdelegates the leading candidate needs to win the nomination in a given scenario.
  • All of the calculator's formulas and data come from Jason Furman, the director of the Hamilton Project at the Brookings Institution.
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Chadwick Matlin is Slate's visiting Dutko Fellow. Chris Wilson is an editorial assistant at Slate in Washington, D.C.
Illustration by Mark Alan Stamaty. Interactive tool designed by Matt Dodson and Chris Wilson.
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