Delegate Math: It's for the Berds

As of right now, the delegate count estimate for pledged delegates is Hillary Clinton at 1265, and Bernie Sanders at 1039. These numbers fluctuate from source to source, but they all show Clinton with a lead of over 220 delegates.

As of March 29, 2016

There has been 35 contests so far in the 2016 Democratic Primary, in 2008 after “Super Tuesday” there were 29 contests and Clinton was ahead of Obama by 20 pledged delegates(1056-1036).

After another 11 contests Obama took the lead by 101 delegates(1323-1222). Clinton could not close the gap to within 50 throughout the contest, not by March, or June. But the pledged delegate count was at +62 delegates for Obama as the primaries ended(1794.5-1732.5).

Many Sanders supporters and surrogates tell everyone to forget the large superdelegate lead Clinton has, but fail to state that the winning number you must achieve(2383) is exactly half of the total delegates(including superdelegates) plus 1. Or 50.01% of 4765 delegates.

So if we are excluding superdelegates, that winning number would change also. Since there are 714 superdelegates and 4051 pledged delegates, we would multiply 4051 by 50.01% to arrive at the new magic number of 2026.

Delegate math — Without superdelegates

Since there are 1747 pledged delegates remaining, Clinton would need 761 of those to achieve a majority of pledged delegates in this contest. Or about 43.5% of the remaining pledged delegates.

These are the remaining contests.

Remaining contests and delegates.

If Hillary just wins half of the delegates from the States she is ahead in from polls taken in those contests, she will be close to achieving the magic number. If she performs anywhere near the current polling in those contests, she will not only surpass the number, but close in on 2383. Here is the delegates she and Bernie would gain if they split the delegates in almost all of those contests, besides DC where Hillary having a 70-30 split is generous.

Delegate Math:It’s for the Berds

That is 597 delegates Clinton would get, for splitting the delegates. That leaves her needing 164 delegates from the remaining contests to achieve a majority of pledged delegates. Wisconsin(86), Connecticut(55), Indiana(83), Kentucky(55) and Oregon(61) have a combined  total of 340 pledged delegates. Think Sanders can win those contests by a 3-1 ration? To tie Clinton? And that all supposes they split the delegates in NY, CA, MD, NJ and NM.

The superdelegates aren’t coming to save the Sanders campaign and steal the pledged delegate winners election.

Delegate math: It’s for the Berds.