The System Isn’t ‘Rigged’ Against Sanders; Clinton’s winning because more Democrats want her to be the nominee

[kitler53]

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-system-isnt-rigged-against-sanders/



A week ago, New York Daily News columnist and Bernie Sanders supporter Shaun King tweeted the following about the Democratic caucuses in Washington, which took place in late March:

Washington State has 7.2 million people. @BernieSanders won 71% of the votes. NONE of those votes count in the "popular vote totals".

— Shaun King (@ShaunKing) May 19, 2016

Whether King intended it or not, he implied that caucuses — which often require hours of participation and mean lower turnout — are representative of what would happen if a larger electorate had its say. Well, a funny thing happened in Washington on Tuesday: The state held a mail-in, beauty-contest primary — so voting was easy, but no delegates were at stake. (The Associated Press has declared Hillary Clinton the winner.) The results are still being finalized, but Clinton leads by about 6 percentage points with more than 700,000 votes counted. Sanders won the Washington caucuses, which had 230,000 participants, by 46 percentage points.

So, turnout was much higher in the Washington primary than in the caucuses, and Clinton did much better. Something similar happened in Nebraska, where Clinton lost the early March caucuses by 14 percentage points and won the early May primary, in which no delegates were awarded, by 7 points.

Nebraska and Washington are part of a pattern. As Sanders fans claim that the Democratic primary system is rigged against their candidate and that Sanders wins when turnout is higher, they fail to point out that Sanders has benefited tremendously from low-turnout caucuses. Indeed, if all the caucuses were primaries, Clinton would be winning the Democratic nomination by an even wider margin than she is now.

Let's start out with the real-world numbers. Here are the delegate and vote totals by contest, including caucuses and primaries, so far:

[th][/th] [th]POPULAR VOTE (THOUSANDS)[/th] [th]PLEDGED DELEGATES[/th]
[th]STATE[/th] [th]CAUCUS[/th] [th]CLOSED[/th] [th]WINNER[/th] [th][/th] [th]CLINTON[/th] [th]SANDERS[/th] [th]CLINTON[/th] [th]SANDERS[/th]
Iowa	✓		Clinton	+0	85	85	23	21
N.H.			Sanders	+22	95	152	9	15
Nevada	✓	✓	Clinton	+5	44	40	20	15
South Carolina			Clinton	+47	272	96	39	14
Alabama			Clinton	+59	309	76	44	9
Am. Samoa	✓		Clinton	+43	<1	<1	4	2
Arkansas			Clinton	+36	146	66	22	10
Georgia			Clinton	+43	546	216	73	29
Massachusetts			Clinton	+1	607	590	46	45
Oklahoma			Sanders	+10	139	174	17	21
Tennessee			Clinton	+34	246	121	44	23
Texas			Clinton	+32	936	477	147	75
Vermont			Sanders	+72	18	116	0	16
Virginia			Clinton	+29	505	276	62	33
Colorado	✓	✓	Sanders	+19	50	73	25	41
Minnesota	✓		Sanders	+23	78	126	31	46
Louisiana		✓	Clinton	+48	222	72	37	14
Nebraska	✓	✓	Sanders	+14	14	19	10	15
Kansas	✓	✓	Sanders	+35	13	26	10	23
Maine	✓	✓	Sanders	+29	16	30	8	17
Michigan			Sanders	+1	582	599	63	67
Mississippi			Clinton	+66	187	38	31	5
N. Marianas	✓	✓	Clinton	+20	<1	<1	4	2
Florida		✓	Clinton	+31	1,101	569	141	73
Illinois			Clinton	+2	1,040	999	79	77
Missouri			Clinton	+0	312	311	36	35
North Carolina			Clinton	+14	623	467	60	47
Ohio			Clinton	+13	697	535	81	62
Dems abroad			Sanders	+38	11	24	4	9
Arizona		✓	Clinton	+15	262	193	42	33
Utah	✓		Sanders	+59	15	60	6	27
Idaho	✓		Sanders	+57	5	19	5	18
Hawaii	✓		Sanders	+40	10	24	8	17
Washington	✓		Sanders	+46	62	167	27	74
Alaska	✓	✓	Sanders	+59	2	8	3	13
Wisconsin			Sanders	+14	434	570	38	48
Wyoming	✓	✓	Sanders	+11	3	4	7	7
New York		✓	Clinton	+16	1,134	820	139	108
Pennsylvania		✓	Clinton	+12	922	722	106	83
Rhode Island			Sanders	+12	53	67	11	13
Connecticut		✓	Clinton	+5	170	152	28	27
Delaware		✓	Clinton	+21	56	37	12	9
Maryland		✓	Clinton	+29	573	310	61	34
Indiana			Sanders	+5	303	335	39	44
Guam	✓	✓	Clinton	+19	1	1	4	3
West Virginia			Sanders	+16	86	123	11	18
Kentucky		✓	Clinton	+0	213	211	28	27
Oregon		✓	Sanders	+13	264	347	26	35
Total			Clinton	+12	13,463	10,544	1,771	1,499

Democratic votes and delegates based on actual results [/table]

Popular vote in Iowa, Nevada, Maine, Washington and Wyoming is estimated based on overall turnout.

Sources: Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections, The Green Papers, U.S. Elections Project


 
Counting only caucuses, Sanders has won 63 percent of the vote, 64 percent of the delegates and 11 of the 16 contests. In doing so, he has earned 341 elected delegates, compared with Clinton's 195 delegates, for a margin of 146 delegates. These caucuses have had approximately¹ 1.1 million participants. As a point of comparison, turnout in the caucuses has been only about 13 percent of the total number of votes President Obama got in the 2012 presidential election in these states.²

Sanders has done far worse in the states that have held primaries. Counting just primaries, including Tuesday's in Washington,³ Sanders has won only 42 percent of the vote, 42 percent of delegates and 10 of the 34 statewide contests.⁴ Clinton earned 1,576 elected delegates, compared with Sanders's 1,158, for a margin of 418. The turnout in these contests has been far higher than in the caucuses, with a little more than 24 million votes cast. That's about 49 percent of the total number of votes Obama got in the 2012 election in these states.⁵

Now, it is fair to point out that the caucuses have taken place in states that are demographically different than the primary states. Caucus states in 2016 are overwhelmingly white and overwhelmingly rural compared with primary states. Still, these differences don't come close to explaining the differences in results between the caucuses and primaries so far. We can look to Nebraska and Washington as two examples of the disparity. Of course, one could argue that because no delegates were up for grabs in those states' primaries, the campaigns didn't really compete for residents' votes and therefore those contests aren't representative of what a truly competitive primary would look like there. Fortunately, because the vote in the Democratic primary has largely broken down along demographic lines, we can use statistical models to approximate what would happen if states that held caucuses had held primaries instead.

At various times, we've tried using demographics to model the vote in the Democratic nomination contest so far. The model considers each 2016 contest and controls for (i) the black and Hispanic share of the Democratic vote in that state in the 2008 general election, (ii) whether that primary or caucus is "open" to independent voters unaffiliated with a political party, and (iii) the margin in national primary polls at the time the contest is held. This model estimates that holding caucuses instead of primaries is a massive advantage for Sanders. In fact, Clinton would do about 20 to 25 percentage points better relative to Sanders if a state changed from a caucus to a primary, the model estimates.

Here's how we project each caucus would have gone if a primary had been held instead:⁶

[th][/th] [th]POPULAR VOTE (THOUSANDS)[/th] [th]PLEDGED DELEGATES[/th]
[th]STATE[/th] [th]CLOSED[/th] [th]WINNER[/th] [th][/th] [th]CLINTON[/th] [th]SANDERS[/th] [th]CLINTON[/th] [th]SANDERS[/th]
Iowa		Clinton	+24	301	182	27	17
Nevada	✓	Clinton	+29	185	101	23	12
Am. Samoa		Clinton	+60	4	1	5	1
Colorado	✓	Clinton	+6	331	295	35	31
Minnesota		Clinton	+1	402	394	39	38
Nebraska	✓	Clinton	+7	79	70	13	12
Kansas	✓	Sanders	+12	91	116	15	18
Maine	✓	Sanders	+5	92	102	12	13
N. Marianas	✓	Clinton	+39	3	1	4	2
Utah		Sanders	+39	52	120	10	23
Idaho		Sanders	+37	33	72	7	16
Hawaii		Sanders	+17	63	88	10	15
Washington		Clinton	+6	471	418	53	48
Alaska	✓	Sanders	+40	17	40	5	11
Wyoming	✓	Clinton	+13	19	15	8	6
Guam	✓	Clinton	+42	10	4	5	2
Current primary states		Clinton	+14	13,064	9,861	1,576	1,158
Total		Clinton	+12	15,216	11,880	1,847	1,423

Projected Democratic results if caucus states had held primaries [/table]

Sanders fans have claimed that because caucuses have lower turnout the current national caucus and primary vote underrates how well Sanders is doing. In fact, the opposite is true. When we switch all caucuses over to primaries, Sanders actually does worse. Clinton's lead in the popular vote would grow from 2.9 to 3.3 million votes. Moreover, her edge in elected delegates would expand significantly.⁷ Instead of her current lead of 272 elected delegates, Clinton would be ahead by 424.⁸ Some states that were won by Sanders in caucuses, including Colorado and Minnesota, would be won by Clinton in primaries, according to our calculations.

In fact, counting the 537 superdelegates The Associated Press currently gives Clinton, she would likely have 2,384 total delegates if every state had held a primary. That's one more than necessary to clinch the nomination.

But what would happen if every state held a primary that was open to independent voters? Independent voters, after all, have been among Sanders's strongest groups, and Sanders supporters have consistently cited closed contests as evidence the game is rigged. We can rerun the same regression as above but estimate what would happen if all the primaries are open to unaffiliated voters.

[th][/th] [th]POPULAR VOTE (THOUSANDS)[/th] [th]PLEDGED DELEGATES[/th]
[th]STATE[/th] [th]WINNER[/th] [th][/th] [th]CLINTON[/th] [th]SANDERS[/th] [th]CLINTON[/th] [th]SANDERS[/th]
Iowa	Clinton	+24	301	182	27	17
Nevada	Clinton	+18	188	130	21	14
Am. Samoa	Clinton	+60	4	1	5	1
Colorado	Sanders	+6	331	373	31	35
Minnesota	Clinton	+1	402	394	39	38
Louisiana	Clinton	+39	240	100	36	15
Nebraska	Sanders	+5	79	88	12	13
Kansas	Sanders	+23	90	144	13	20
Maine	Sanders	+16	91	127	10	15
N. Marianas	Clinton	+30	3	2	4	2
Florida	Clinton	+20	1,159	760	129	85
Arizona	Clinton	+4	267	248	39	36
Utah	Sanders	+39	52	120	10	23
Idaho	Sanders	+37	33	72	7	16
Hawaii	Sanders	+17	63	88	10	15
Washington	Clinton	+6	471	418	53	48
Alaska	Sanders	+50	16	48	4	12
Wyoming	Clinton	+2	19	19	7	7
New York	Clinton	+4	1,146	1,049	129	118
Pennsylvania	Clinton	+0	915	907	95	94
Connecticut	Sanders	+6	176	200	26	29
Delaware	Clinton	+9	58	49	11	10
Maryland	Clinton	+18	581	399	56	39
Guam	Clinton	+31	11	6	5	2
Kentucky	Sanders	+10	205	256	24	31
Oregon	Sanders	+25	251	418	23	38
Current open primary states	Clinton	+12	8,146	6,429	956	715
Total	Clinton	+8	15,298	13,024	1,782	1,488

Projected results if every state had held an open primary [/table]

An "open" primary allows the participation of voters not registered with either major political party.
 

Clinton's margin in the national popular vote shrinks to about 8 percentage points (from 12). That's because opening a primary to independent voters shrinks Clinton's margin in a state by about 10 percentage points on average, according to the model. Sanders would also project to win Connecticut and Kentucky, which he lost in the real world when they held closed primaries.

Still, this wouldn't make all that much difference. Just 11 states⁹ held closed primaries, so the national vote is mostly reflective of a process open to unaffiliated voters. Indeed, Clinton has won 14 primaries¹⁰ open to independent voters, while Sanders has won nine.

In fact, if all states held primaries open to independents — instead of closed primaries, or caucuses of any kind — Clinton might have a larger lead in elected delegates than she does now. The model indicates that Clinton would have a lead of 294 elected delegates, compared with the 272 she holds now. That's not a huge difference, but it means that Clinton has been hurt at least as much by caucuses as Sanders has been hurt by closed primaries.

What would happen if the primary system conformed to each candidate's best-case scenario? (All closed primaries for Clinton and all caucuses open to independent voters for Sanders.) If every state held a closed primary, Clinton would beat Sanders by 19 percentage points and have a 654 elected delegate advantage, we estimate. If, however, each state held an open caucus, Sanders would beat Clinton by 22 percentage points nationwide and have a 496 elected delegate lead. Of course, neither of those scenarios would happen.

Realistically, if you throw everything together, the math suggests that Sanders doesn't have much to complain about. If the Democratic nomination were open to as many Democrats as possible — through closed primaries — Clinton would be dominating Sanders. And if the nomination were open to as many voters as possible — through open primaries — she'd still be winning.


Footnotes

• Some states, such as Nevada, do not release official turnout totals. In states without official totals, approximations were released. We used these approximations as compiled by Michael McDonald at the United States Elections Project. ^
• We exclude territories from this estimate because they don't vote in general elections. ^
• The Washington count is as of Thursday morning, Eastern time. ^
• This includes the Nebraska primary for which no delegates were awarded. ^
• We exclude the Democrats Abroad primary because there is no equivalent contest in the general election. ^
• In Washington and Nebraska, which actually held a primary in addition to a caucus, we used the primary results instead of the model to estimate Clinton's and Sanders's vote shares, although we used the model to estimate what turnout would have been. ^
• Why does Clinton's delegate lead expand so significantly while her margin in the popular vote does not? If a state changes from a caucus to a primary, Clinton does better and gains more delegates in these states. But caucuses have such small voter participation that they don't really contribute much to the national vote total. According to our calculations, turnout typically goes up about three to four times when you move from a caucus to a primary. (This is based on a simple regression in which the dependent variable is turnout as ratio of Obama votes in the 2012 general election. The regression controls for whether independent voters can vote in the primary.) So, Clinton does better in the shift from caucuses to primaries, but we're still adding a bunch of votes from more Sanders friendly states such as Colorado and Minnesota to the overall popular vote count. As a result, the national primary vote wouldn't change — Clinton would win by 12 percentage points according to our calculation. ^
• In our projections of how caucus states would vote if they held a primary instead, delegates were allocated strictly proportionally. ^
• Including Nebraska. ^
• Including Washington. ^

[Max King of the Wild]

I like the tweet that makes it sound like 5.11 million people voted for Sanders in Washington

I also love the ignorant morons who believe the nominations are un-American / antidemocratic. The parties are a separate entity. they can decide how to pick their nominee (which is the way it's been for decades... Which Sanders was aware of from the start). I mean, they are running it in the best interest of their party... Why would they want a loon like Sanders who is self proclaimed independent who changed to Democrat to be able to tap in one of the major parties resources to be the voice of the party? And why would they want people who aren't aligned with their party to decide the fate of the party?

[the-pi-guy]

Obviously.

[Raven]

I like the tweet that makes it sound like 5.11 million people voted for Sanders in Washington

I also love the ignorant morons who believe the nominations are un-American / antidemocratic. The parties are a separate entity. they can decide how to pick their nominee (which is the way it's been for decades... Which Sanders was aware of from the start). I mean, they are running it in the best interest of their party... Why would they want a loon like Sanders who is self proclaimed independent who changed to Democrat to be able to tap in one of the major parties resources to be the voice of the party? And why would they want people who aren't aligned with their party to decide the fate of the party?

Just look at the absurd number of Americans who think that the US is or was intended to be a direct democracy instead of a constitutional republic. Our government was actually designed to avoid, as much as possible, the stupidity of the masses shaping policies while still giving the people some kind of voice.

[Legend]

I expected this to have been part of the OP.