In
American politics, a superdelegate is an unpledged delegate to the
Democratic National Convention
The Democratic National Convention (DNC) is a series of presidential nominating conventions held every four years since 1832 by the United States Democratic Party. They have been administered by the Democratic National Committee since the 1852 ...
who is seated automatically and chooses for themselves for whom they vote. These
Democratic Party Democratic Party most often refers to:
*Democratic Party (United States)
Democratic Party and similar terms may also refer to:
Active parties Africa
*Botswana Democratic Party
*Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea
*Gabonese Democratic Party
*Demo ...
superdelegates (who make up slightly under 15% of all convention
delegates) include party leaders and elected officials (PLEOs).
Democratic superdelegates are free to support any candidate for the presidential nomination. This contrasts with pledged delegates who are selected based on the
party primaries and
caucus
A caucus is a meeting of supporters or members of a specific political party or movement. The exact definition varies between different countries and political cultures.
The term originated in the United States, where it can refer to a meeting ...
es in each
U.S. state, in which voters choose among candidates for the party's
presidential
President most commonly refers to:
*President (corporate title)
*President (education), a leader of a college or university
* President (government title)
President may also refer to:
Automobiles
* Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese fu ...
nomination. On August 25, 2018, the Democratic National Committee agreed to reduce the influence of superdelegates by generally preventing them from voting on the first ballot at the Democratic National Convention, allowing their votes only in a contested nomination.
Superdelegates are not involved in the
Republican Party
Republican Party is a name used by many political parties around the world, though the term most commonly refers to the United States' Republican Party.
Republican Party may also refer to:
Africa
*Republican Party (Liberia)
* Republican Part ...
nomination process. The state chairman and two district-level committee members from each state are automatically seated at the
Republican National Convention, but they are mostly obliged to vote for their state's popular vote winner under the rules of the party branch to which they belong.
Although the term ''superdelegate'' was originally coined and created to describe a type of Democratic delegate, the term has become widely used to describe these delegates in both parties. However, it is not an official term used by either party.
Description
Of all the delegates to the Democratic National Convention, slightly under 15% are superdelegates.
[Drew DeSilver]
Who are the Democratic superdelegates?
Pew Research Center (May 5, 2016). According to the
Pew Research Center, superdelegates are "the embodiment of the institutional Democratic Party – everyone from former presidents, congressional leaders and big-money fundraisers to mayors, labor leaders and longtime local party functionaries."
For Democrats, superdelegates fall into four categories based on other positions they hold, and are formally described (in Rule 9.A) as "unpledged party leader and elected official delegates" (unpledged PLEO delegates) consisting of
# Elected members of the
Democratic National Committee
The Democratic National Committee (DNC) is the governing body of the United States Democratic Party. The committee coordinates strategy to support Democratic Party candidates throughout the country for local, state, and national office, as well ...
: "the chairs and vice chairs of each state and territorial Democratic Party; 212 national committeemen and committeewomen elected to represent their states; top officials of the DNC itself and several of its auxiliary groups (such as the Democratic Attorneys General Association, the
National Federation of Democratic Women and the
Young Democrats of America
The Young Democrats of America (YDA) is the youth wing of the Democratic Party of the United States. YDA operates as a separate organization from the Democratic National Committee; following the passage of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act, it ...
); and 75 at-large members who are nominated by the party chairman and chosen by the full DNC."
Most of the at-large members "are local party leaders, officeholders and donors or representatives of important Democratic constituencies, such as
organized labor."
There were 437 DNC members (with 433 votes) who were superdelegates at the
2016 Democratic National Convention.
# Democratic governors (including territorial governors and the
mayor of the District of Columbia). There were 21 Democratic governors who were superdelegates at the 2016 Democratic National Convention.
# Democratic members of
Congress. There were 191 U.S. representatives (including
non-voting delegates from
Washington, D.C. and territories) and 47 U.S. senators (including
Washington, D.C. shadow senators) who were superdelegates at the 2016 Democratic National Convention.
# Distinguished party leaders (consisting of current and former presidents, vice presidents, congressional leaders, and DNC chairs). There were 20 of these who were superdelegates at the 2016 Democratic National Convention.
Of the superdelegates at the 2016 Convention, 58% were male and 62% were non-Hispanic white (20% were black and 11% were
Hispanic
The term ''Hispanic'' ( es, hispano) refers to people, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or Hispanidad.
The term commonly applies to countries with a cultural and historical link to Spain and to viceroyalties for ...
). The average age was about 60.
There is no bar on
lobbyists serving as DNC members (and thus superdelegates); ABC News found that about 9% of superdelegates at the 2016 Democratic National Convention (67 people in all) were former or current lobbyists registered on the federal and state level.
For Republicans, there are three delegates in each state, consisting of the state chairman and two
Republican National Committee
The Republican National Committee (RNC) is a U.S. political committee that assists the Republican Party of the United States. It is responsible for developing and promoting the Republican brand and political platform, as well as assisting in f ...
committee members, who are automatic delegates to the national convention.
However, at the
2012 Republican National Convention, convention rules were amended to obligate these RNC members to vote according to the result of primary elections held in their states if the state holds a primary.
Comparison with pledged delegates
''Unpledged'' PLEO (party leaders and elected officials) delegates should not be confused with ''pledged'' PLEO delegates; Democratic Party rules distinguish pledged and unpledged delegates. Pledged delegates are selected based on their announced preferences in the contest for the presidential nomination. In the
party primary election
Primary elections, or direct primary are a voting process by which voters can indicate their preference for their party's candidate, or a candidate in general, in an upcoming general election, local election, or by-election. Depending on the ...
s and
caucus
A caucus is a meeting of supporters or members of a specific political party or movement. The exact definition varies between different countries and political cultures.
The term originated in the United States, where it can refer to a meeting ...
es in each U.S. state, voters
express their preference among the contenders for the party's nomination for
President of the United States
The president of the United States (POTUS) is the head of state and head of government of the United States of America. The president directs the Federal government of the United States#Executive branch, executive branch of the Federal gove ...
. Pledged delegates supporting each candidate are chosen in approximate ratio to their candidate's share of the vote. They fall into three categories: district-level pledged delegates (usually by
congressional district
Congressional districts, also known as electoral districts and legislative districts, electorates, or wards in other nations, are divisions of a larger administrative region that represent the population of a region in the larger congressional bod ...
s), at-large pledged delegates, and pledged PLEO delegates. In a minority of the states, delegates are legally required to support the candidate to whom they are pledged. In addition to the states' requirements, the party rules state (Rule 12.J): "Delegates elected to the national convention pledged to a presidential candidate shall in all good conscience reflect the sentiments of those who elected them."
By contrast, the unpledged PLEO delegates (Rule 9.A) are seated without regard to their presidential preferences, solely by virtue of being current or former elected officeholders and party officials. Many of them have chosen to announce endorsements, but they are not bound in any way. They may support any candidate they wish, including one who has dropped out of the presidential race.
Under Rule 9.C, the pledged PLEO slots are allocated to candidates based on the results of the primaries and caucuses.
Another difference between pledged PLEOs and unpledged PLEOs is that there is a fixed number of pledged PLEO slots for each state, while the number of unpledged PLEOs can change during the campaign. Pledged PLEO delegates are not generally considered superdelegates.
Origins
After the
1968 Democratic National Convention
The 1968 Democratic National Convention was held August 26–29 at the International Amphitheatre in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Earlier that year incumbent President Lyndon B. Johnson had announced he would not seek reelection, thus maki ...
, at which pro-
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...
liberal
Hubert Humphrey
Hubert Horatio Humphrey Jr. (May 27, 1911 – January 13, 1978) was an American pharmacist and politician who served as the 38th vice president of the United States from 1965 to 1969. He twice served in the United States Senate, representing M ...
was nominated for the presidency despite not running in a single
primary election
Primary elections, or direct primary are a voting process by which voters can indicate their preference for their party's candidate, or a candidate in general, in an upcoming general election, local election, or by-election. Depending on the ...
, the Democratic Party made changes in its delegate selection process to correct what was seen as "illusory" control of the nomination process by primary voters.
[Branko Marcetic, "The Secret History of Super Delegates," ''In These Times,'' vol. 40, no. 6 (June 2016), pg. 21.] A commission headed by
South Dakota
South Dakota (; Sioux language, Sioux: , ) is a U.S. state in the West North Central states, North Central region of the United States. It is also part of the Great Plains. South Dakota is named after the Lakota people, Lakota and Dakota peo ...
senator
George McGovern
George Stanley McGovern (July 19, 1922 – October 21, 2012) was an American historian and South Dakota politician who was a U.S. representative and three-term U.S. senator, and the Democratic Party presidential nominee in the 1972 pre ...
and
Minnesota
Minnesota () is a state in the upper midwestern region of the United States. It is the 12th largest U.S. state in area and the List of U.S. states and territories by population, 22nd most populous, with over 5.75 million residents. Minne ...
representative
Donald M. Fraser
Donald MacKay Fraser (February 20, 1924 – June 2, 2019) was an American politician from Minnesota who served as U.S. Representative from Minnesota's 5th congressional district from 1963 to 1979 and as mayor of Minneapolis from 1980 to 1994.
Ea ...
met in 1969 and 1970 to make the composition of the Democratic Party's nominating convention less subject to control by party leaders and more responsive to the votes cast in primary elections.
The rules implemented by the
McGovern-Fraser Commission shifted the balance of power to primary elections and caucuses, mandating that all delegates be chosen via mechanisms open to all party members.
As a result of this change the number of primaries more than doubled over the next three presidential election cycles, from 17 in 1968 to 35 in 1980.
Despite the radically increased level of primary participation, with 32 million voters taking part in the selection process by 1980, the Democrats proved largely unsuccessful at the ballot box, with the 1972 presidential campaign of McGovern and the 1980 re-election campaign of
Jimmy Carter
James Earl Carter Jr. (born October 1, 1924) is an American politician who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. A member of the Democratic Party, he previously served as the 76th governor of Georgia from 19 ...
resulting in landslide defeats.
Democratic Party affiliation skidded from 41 percent of the electorate at the time of the McGovern-Fraser Commission report to just 31 percent in the aftermath of the 1980 electoral debacle.
Further soul-searching took place among party leaders, who argued that the pendulum had swung too far in the direction of primary elections over insider decision-making, with one May 1981 California white paper declaring that the Democratic Party had "lost its leadership, collective vision and ties with the past," resulting in the nomination of unelectable candidates.
[Marcetic, "The Secret History of Super Delegates," pg. 22.] A new 70-member commission headed by
Governor of North Carolina
The governor of North Carolina is the head of government of the U.S. state of North Carolina. The governor directs the executive branch of the government and is the commander in chief of the military forces of the state. The current governor, ...
Jim Hunt was appointed to further refine the Democratic Party's nomination process, attempting to balance the wishes of rank-and-file Democrats with the collective wisdom of party leaders and to thereby avoid the nomination of insurgent candidates exemplified by the liberal McGovern or the anti-Washington conservative Carter and lessening the potential influence of
single-issue politics in the selection process.
Following a series of meetings held from August 1981 to February 1982, the Hunt Commission issued a report which recommended the setting aside of unelected and unpledged delegate slots for Democratic members of Congress and for state party chairs and vice chairs (so-called "superdelegates").
With the original Hunt plan, superdelegates were to represent 30% of all delegates to the national convention, but when it was finally implemented by the
Democratic National Committee
The Democratic National Committee (DNC) is the governing body of the United States Democratic Party. The committee coordinates strategy to support Democratic Party candidates throughout the country for local, state, and national office, as well ...
for the 1984 election, the number of superdelegates was set Over time this percentage has gradually increased, until by 2008 the percentage stood at approximately 20% of total delegates to the Democratic Party nominating convention.
DNC Unity Reform Commission and superdelegate reform, 2016–2018
On July 23, 2016, ahead of the
2016 Democratic National Convention, the 2016 DNC Rules Committee voted overwhelmingly (158–6) to adopt a superdelegate reform package. The new rules were the result of a compromise between the
Hillary Clinton
Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton ( Rodham; born October 26, 1947) is an American politician, diplomat, and former lawyer who served as the 67th United States Secretary of State for President Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013, as a United States senat ...
and the
Bernie Sanders presidential campaigns; in the past, Sanders had pressed for the complete elimination of superdelegates.
Under the reform package, in future Democratic Conventions, about two-thirds of superdelegates would be bound to the results of state primaries and
caucus
A caucus is a meeting of supporters or members of a specific political party or movement. The exact definition varies between different countries and political cultures.
The term originated in the United States, where it can refer to a meeting ...
es. The remaining one-third—members of Congress, governors, and distinguished party leaders—would remain unpledged and free to support the candidate of their choice.
Under the reform package, a 21-member unity commission, chaired by Clinton supporter Jennifer O'Malley Dillon and vice-chaired by Sanders supporter
Larry Cohen, was appointed after the
2016 general election. The commission's recommendations would be voted on at the next Democratic National Committee meeting, well before the beginning of the 2020 Democratic primaries.
The commission was to consider "a mix of Clinton and Sanders ideas": expanding the ability of eligible voters to participate in caucuses (an idea supported by Clinton) and expanding the ability of unaffiliated or new voters to join the Democratic Party and vote in Democratic primaries via
same-day registration and re-registration (an idea supported by Sanders).
The commission drew comparisons to the
McGovern–Fraser Commission, which established party primary reforms before the
1972 Democratic National Convention.
By April 2017, the complete committee had been appointed. In accordance with the compromise agreement, the 21 members include, in addition to O'Malley Dillon and Cohen; nine members selected by Clinton, seven selected by Sanders, and three selected by the DNC chair (
Tom Perez). By May 2017, the DNC Unity Reform Commission had begun to meet to begin drafting reforms, including superdelegate reform as well as primary calendar and caucus reform.
In a series of meetings in the summer and fall of 2017, the Unity Commission "considered various proposals for dealing with superdelegates — including automatically binding their votes to their states' choice" but the issue of whether to abolish superdelegates altogether remained controversial within the party.
[Gabriel Debenedetti]
Kaine calls for eliminating superdelegates: Hillary Clinton’s VP sides with Bernie Sanders in a fight that’s divided Democrats
''Politico'' (November 15, 2017). In December 2017, the Unity Commission's recommendations were delivered to the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee. By December 7, both Perez and Deputy DNC Chair
Keith Ellison
Keith Maurice Ellison (born August 4, 1963) is an American politician and lawyer serving as the 30th attorney general of Minnesota. A member of the Democratic–Farmer–Labor Party (DFL), Ellison was the U.S. representative for from 2007 to ...
co-authored an "op-ed" document for CNN, stating they intended to make "a "significant reduction" of the number of superdelegates who vote to decide the party's nominee for president". Ultimately, the DNC decided to prevent superdelegates from voting on the first ballot, instead of reducing their numbers.
Superdelegates in practice
1984 election
In 1984, only state party chairs and vice chairs were guaranteed superdelegate status. The remaining spots were divided two ways. Democratic members of Congress were allowed to select up to 60% of their members to fill some of these spots. The remaining positions were left to the state parties to fill with priority given to governors and big-city mayors, led by Democrats and based on population.
In the
1984 election, the major contenders for the presidential nomination were
Gary Hart,
Jesse Jackson
Jesse Louis Jackson ( né Burns; born October 8, 1941) is an American political activist, Baptist minister, and politician. He was a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1984 and 1988 and served as a shadow U.S. senato ...
, and
Walter Mondale
Walter Frederick "Fritz" Mondale (January 5, 1928 – April 19, 2021) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 42nd vice president of the United States from 1977 to 1981 under President Jimmy Carter. A U.S. senator from Minnesot ...
. Entering the final handful of primaries on June 5, Mondale was leading Hart in the delegate count, with Jackson far behind. The battle for delegates became more dramatic that night when Hart won three primaries, including the big prize of California in a cliffhanger. The Mondale campaign said, and some news reports agreed, that Mondale secured the needed 1,967 delegates to clinch the nomination that night in spite of losing California. But the
Associated Press
The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. n ...
concluded he was "barely short of the magic majority." Mondale wanted to make it indisputable that he had enough delegate votes, and his campaign set a deadline of one minute before noon; he made 50 calls in three hours to nail down an additional 40 superdelegates and declared at a press conference that he had 2,008 delegate votes. At
the convention in July, Mondale won on the first ballot.
1988 election
In 1988, this process was simplified. Democrats in Congress were now allowed to select up to 80% of their members. All Democratic National Committee members and all Democratic governors were given superdelegate status. This year also saw the addition of the ''distinguished party leader'' category (although former DNC chairs were not added to this category until 1996, and former House and Senate minority leaders were not added until 2000). In 1992 was the addition of a category of unpledged "add-ons", a fixed number of spots allocated to the states, intended for other party leaders and elected officials not already covered by the previous categories. Finally, beginning in 1996, all Democratic members of Congress were given superdelegate status.
[Terry Michael]
The Democratic Party's Presidential Nominating Process
. March 2004 (pages 14-15)
The superdelegates have not always prevailed, however. In the Democratic primary phase of the
2004 election,
Howard Dean
Howard Brush Dean III (born November 17, 1948) is an American physician, author, lobbyist, and retired politician who served as the 79th governor of Vermont from 1991 to 2003 and chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) from 2005 to 200 ...
acquired an early lead in delegate counts by obtaining the support of a number of superdelegates before even the first primaries were held. Nevertheless,
John Kerry
John Forbes Kerry (born December 11, 1943) is an American attorney, politician and diplomat who currently serves as the first United States special presidential envoy for climate. A member of the Forbes family and the Democratic Party (Unite ...
defeated Dean in a succession of primaries and caucuses and won the nomination.
In 1988, a study found that superdelegates and delegates selected through the primary and caucus process are not substantively different in terms of viewpoints on issues from each other. However, superdelegates are more likely to prefer candidates with Washington experience than outsider candidates.
2008 election
At the
2008 Democratic National Convention
The 2008 Democratic National Convention was a quadrennial presidential nominating convention of the Democratic Party where it adopted its national platform and officially nominated its candidates for president and vice president. The conve ...
, the superdelegates made up approximately one-fifth of the total number of delegates. The closeness of the race between the leading contenders,
Hillary Clinton
Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton ( Rodham; born October 26, 1947) is an American politician, diplomat, and former lawyer who served as the 67th United States Secretary of State for President Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013, as a United States senat ...
and
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, Obama was the first Af ...
, led to speculation that the superdelegates would play a decisive role in selecting the nominee, a prospect that caused unease among some Democratic Party leaders. Obama led in pledged delegates at the end of voting in the state contests while not winning enough to secure the nomination without the superdelegates and he received enough superdelegate endorsements shortly thereafter that Hillary agreed to end her campaign before the superdelegates voted at the convention even though Hillary had enough delegates that the superdelegates could have made either candidate the nominee at the convention.
At the
2008 Democratic National Convention
The 2008 Democratic National Convention was a quadrennial presidential nominating convention of the Democratic Party where it adopted its national platform and officially nominated its candidates for president and vice president. The conve ...
, superdelegates cast approximately 823.5 votes, with fractions arising because superdelegates from
Michigan
Michigan () is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the List of U.S. states and ...
,
Florida
Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, a ...
, and
Democrats Abroad are entitled to half a vote each. Of the superdelegates' votes, 745 were from unpledged PLEO delegates and 78.5 were from unpledged add-on delegates.
There was no fixed number of unpledged PLEO delegates. The number was allowed to change during the campaign as particular individuals gained or lost qualification under a particular category. The unpledged PLEO delegates were: all Democratic members of the
United States Congress
The United States Congress is the legislature of the federal government of the United States. It is bicameral, composed of a lower body, the House of Representatives, and an upper body, the Senate. It meets in the U.S. Capitol in Washi ...
, Democratic
governors, members of the
Democratic National Committee
The Democratic National Committee (DNC) is the governing body of the United States Democratic Party. The committee coordinates strategy to support Democratic Party candidates throughout the country for local, state, and national office, as well ...
, "
l former Democratic presidents, all former Democratic vice presidents, all former Democratic leaders of the U.S. Senate, all former Democratic speakers of the U.S. House of Representatives and Democratic minority leaders, as applicable, and all former chairs of the Democratic National Committee."
There was an exception, however, for otherwise qualified individuals who endorse another party's candidate for President; under Rule 9.A, they lose their superdelegate status.
In 2008, Senator
Joe Lieberman
Joseph Isadore Lieberman (; born February 24, 1942) is an American politician, lobbyist, and attorney who served as a United States senator from Connecticut from 1989 to 2013. A former member of the Democratic Party, he was its nominee for V ...
of
Connecticut
Connecticut () is the southernmost state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the south. Its cap ...
endorsed Republican
John McCain, which, according to the chairwoman of the Connecticut Democratic Party, resulted in his disqualification as a superdelegate. Lieberman's status had, however, previously been questioned because, although he was a registered Democratic voter and caucused with the Democrats, he won re-election as the candidate of the
Connecticut for Lieberman Party and was listed as an "Independent Democrat". The count for Connecticut's delegates in the state party's delegate selection plan, issued before his endorsement of McCain, reportedly excluded Lieberman, and he was not included on at least one list of PLEO delegates prepared before his endorsement. In the end, he was not a superdelegate and did not attend the Democratic Convention; he was instead a speaker at the Republican Convention.
The unpledged add-on delegate slots for the various states totaled 81, but the initial rule had been that the five unpledged add-on delegates from Michigan and Florida would not be seated, leaving 76 unpledged add-on delegates. Michigan and Florida were being penalized for violating Democratic Party rules by holding their primaries too early.
The exact number of superdelegates changed several times because of events. For example, the number decreased as a result of the death of Representative
Tom Lantos, the move from Maine to Florida of former Maine governor
Kenneth M. Curtis, and the resignation of
New York Governor Eliot Spitzer. (Because New York's new governor,
David Paterson, was an at-large member of the Democratic National Committee, he was already a superdelegate before becoming governor.) On the other hand, the number increased when special elections for the House of Representatives were won by Democrats
Bill Foster,
André Carson,
Jackie Speier, and
Travis Childers.
The biggest change came on May 31 as a result of the meeting of the national party's Rules and Bylaws Committee, which lessened the penalty initially imposed on Michigan and Florida. The party had excluded all delegates (including superdelegates) from either state. The Rules and Bylaws Committee voted to seat all these superdelegates (as well as the pledged delegates from those states) but with half a vote each. That action added 55 superdelegates with 27.5 votes. The total number of superdelegates could continue to change until the beginning of the convention (Call to the Convention Section IV(C)(2)). On August 24, the Democratic Party, at the request of Obama, awarded delegates from Michigan and Florida full voting rights.
Pledged delegates from state caucuses and primaries eventually numbered 3,573, casting 3,566 votes, resulting in a total number of delegate votes of 4,419. A candidate needed a majority of that total, or 2,209, to win the nomination. Superdelegates accounted for approximately one fifth (19.6%) of all votes at the convention and delegates chosen in the Democratic caucuses and primaries accounted for approximately four-fifths (80.4%) of the Democratic convention delegates.
At the convention, Obama won 3,188.5 delegate votes and Hillary Clinton won 1,010.5 with 1 abstention and 218 delegates not voting.
''
Politico
''Politico'' (stylized in all caps), known originally as ''The Politico'', is an American, German-owned political journalism newspaper company based in Arlington County, Virginia, that covers politics and policy in the United States and intern ...
'' found that about half of the superdelegates were white men, compared to 28% of the Democratic primary electorate.
In the Republican Party, as in the Democratic Party, members of the party's national committee automatically become delegates. There are three
Republican National Committee
The Republican National Committee (RNC) is a U.S. political committee that assists the Republican Party of the United States. It is responsible for developing and promoting the Republican brand and political platform, as well as assisting in f ...
delegates (the national committeeman, national committeewoman, and state party chair) for each state.
In the
2008 Republican National Convention
The 2008 Republican National Convention took place at the Xcel Energy Center in Saint Paul, Minnesota, from September 1, through September 4, 2008. The first day of the Republican Party's convention fell on Labor Day, the last day of the popu ...
, 123 RNC delegates among the 2,380 total delegates were not pledged to any candidate.
2016 election
On February 12, 2016,
Debbie Wasserman Schultz, chair of the
Democratic National Committee
The Democratic National Committee (DNC) is the governing body of the United States Democratic Party. The committee coordinates strategy to support Democratic Party candidates throughout the country for local, state, and national office, as well ...
, was asked by
CNN's
Jake Tapper, "What do you tell voters who are new to the process who say this makes them feel like it's all rigged?" Schultz's response was, "Unpledged delegates exist really to make sure that party leaders and elected officials don't have to be in a position where they are running against grass-roots activists . . . And so we separate out those unpledged delegates to make sure that there isn't competition between them." This statement was hailed by Clinton supporters as a wise policy to maintain steady, experienced governance, and derided by
Bernie Sanders' supporters as the establishment thwarting the will of the people.
Several mainstream media outlets included superdelegates in the candidate delegate totals during the primary elections although superdelegates do not actually vote until the Democratic convention and may change their minds on whom they are planning to vote for anytime before the convention. The Democratic National Committee eventually publicly instructed media outlets to not include them in primary delegate totals. Nevertheless, many outlets, including the Associated Press, NBC, CBS, and Politico, continued to report the candidate delegate totals by lumping the superdelegates into the totals, inflating Hillary Clinton's lead by over 400 delegates. Critics alleged that this created a perception of insurmountability and that it was done in order to discourage would-be Sanders supporters.
2020 election
This was the first election with the
2016–2018 superdelegate reform measures. Under these rules, superdelegates cannot vote on the first presidential nominating ballot, unless a candidate via the outcome of primaries and caucuses already has gained enough votes (more than 50% of all delegate votes) among only the elected pledged delegates. Superdelegates may vote in subsequent ballots when it becomes a
contested convention in which the pledged delegate vote alone is insufficient to determine the nominee. This does not preclude superdelegates from publicly endorsing a candidate of their choosing before the convention.
Criticism
Susan Estrich argued that these delegates would have more power than other delegates because of their greater freedom to vote as they wish beginning with the first ballot.
Delegates chosen in primaries and caucuses do not precisely reflect the votes cast, but Democratic Party rules require
proportional allocation of delegates rather than the plurality winner of a state primary or caucus taking all of the delegates ('winner-take-all').
Criticism against the Democratic Party's use of superdelegates also came in November 2017 from
Tim Kaine, Hillary Clinton's former running mate in the 2016 U.S. national election and the junior U.S. senator from Virginia. On November 15, 2017, Kaine stated that he had sent a letter to
Tom Perez, the current DNC Chairman, criticizing the use of the superdelegate system; in general agreement with the junior U.S. senator from Vermont and 2016 Democratic primary challenger
Bernie Sanders, with Kaine stating that "I have long believed there should be no superdelegates. These positions are given undue influence in the popular nominating contest and make the process less democratic."
References
Notes
External links
"Delegate Selection Rules for the 2008 Democratic National Convention"- official Democratic Party rules (note: this is a redirect from the link www.democrats.org/page/-/dem_convention/rules.pdf, on https://web.archive.org/web/20080213002439/http://www.demconvention.com/how-to-become-a-delegate/)
{{United States presidential elections
United States presidential nominating conventions
Organizational structure of political parties