Nevada Dem Caucus: Obama Wins in National Pledged Delegate Count

Turns out Obama won more pledged delegates in Nevada than Clinton despite her win in the percentage column. Due to complex precinct weighting and allocation rules, Obama garnered what's being calculated as 13 pledged national convention delegates to Hillary's 12.

With 98% of precincts counted, the Nevada Dem Party reported Clinton had 5,355 (51%) to Obama's 4,773 (45%), a margin of 582 convention delegates elected to county conventions -- not votes. Instead of releasing caucus vote totals, the Nevada Dem Party released the number of county delegates earned by each candidate. As explained in a statement by the State Party Chair, these numbers have been translated by the media into expected pledged delegates to the national convention for each candidate, which results in Obama being shown to have 13 to Clinton's 12. Confusing, no? I wonder if the actual vote totals will eventually be released. It would be interesting to see what the vote margin was between Clinton and Obama, especially since Sen. Harry Reid's son, Rory, was running things on the ground in Nevada as Chairman for the Clinton camp. Almost 120,000 Dems voted in the caucus.

By the way, there are a number of reports circulating about irregularities at caucus sites that are being blamed on Clinton campaign operatives. According to an item in The Atlantic:

David Plouffe, in a succinct statement appended to a released quotation from his boss, Barack Obama, said the Obama campaign was investigating more than 200 reporters of irregularities in Nevada.

“We currently have reports of over 200 separate incidents of trouble at caucus sites, including doors being closed up to thirty minutes early, registration forms running out so people were turned away, and ID being requested and checked in a non-uniform fashion. This is in addition to the Clinton campaign’s efforts to confuse voters and call into question the at-large caucus sites which clearly had an affect on turnout at these locations. These kinds of Clinton campaign tactics were part of an entire week’s worth of false, divisive, attacks designed to mislead caucus-goers and discredit the caucus itself."