Or, as they are officially known, "unpledged delgates" or PLEOs-Party Leaders and Elected Officials. Both parties have them, but for whatever reason, the term "superdelegate" has stuck only to the Democrats. You've probably read something about them in some kind of news source, but for those who haven't, they are delegates to each party's national convention who can vote for any candidate they wish regardless of the voting in their state (or any other state). McCain's large lead on the Republican side has made them a non-issue, but because Clinton and Obama are so close, there has been a lot of speculation that they could end up deciding the Democratic nomination. Also, superdelegates compose about 20% of the Dems' total and less than 10% of the Republican convention voters.
According to Democratic party rules, the following people are superdelegates:
The individuals recognized as members of the DNC (as set forth in Article Three, Sections 2 and 3 of the Charter of the Democratic Party of the United States); and,
The Democratic President and the Democratic Vice President of the United States, if applicable; and,
All Democratic members of the United States House of Representatives and all Democratic members of the United States Senate; and,
The Democratic Governor, if applicable; and,
All 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.
Superdelegates were created in the 80's in response to party leaders feeling a loss of control after the upswing in primaries; however, they never really worked out that way, as no recent candidate has won a nomination without winning most of the primaries. (Howard Dean was a superdelegate favorite...) Many say that if the superdelegates decide the nominee, it will be undemocratic and the party voters will be dissatisfied. Of course, the counterargument is that party leaders should have some say-it's their party, after all. As of now Clinton has a fairly good lead among superdelegates, but that could always change-there are no official pledges, and they can change their minds at any time. No matter what happens, the Democratic National Convention will probably end up as more than a four-day infomercial...
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2 comments:
Super delegates do not seem like a fair system. By having people who can decide a race yet who arent bound by the choices of the people they "represent" makes it seem like our presidential race is slipping farther away from democracy. The electoral college was sketchy enough, i think this somewhat rivels it.
I've been listening to the news a lot lately - like everybody else - and I've noticed that lots of different TV/news stations have different amounts of delegates for the Democratic side. I've heard ranges from Clinton's 800-1000 to Obama's 700-800ish delegates. However, I think the different numbers of delegates is due to different networks counting pledged delegates and super delegates that have pledged to delegates. But, some networks don't include super delegates in their numbers.
Also, interesting fact: Joe Lieberman was striped of his super delegates because he backed John McCain. I thought that was interesting...
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