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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsTim Kaine calls for eliminating superdelegates
https://www.politico.com/story/2017/11/15/tim-kaine-end-superdelegates-244944"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, Kaine wrote in a letter Wednesday to DNC chairman Tom Perez, according to a copy obtained by POLITICO.
The plea from Kaine himself a former DNC chairman, Hillary Clintons 2016 running mate, and a superdelegate puts him on the side of many backers of Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, Clintons primary opponent in last years race for the White House. Under the current system, elected officials and influential party members get to cast a vote for their preferred presidential candidate with extra weight, regardless of how their state or district votes during the primary.
Pointing to the ongoing work of the Unity Reform Commission appointed last year to review and change the DNCs nominating process, Kaine urged the group to recommend doing away with the superdelegate system altogether, and by extension encouraged Perez to adopt that proposal.
Story continues...

Me.
(35,454 posts)I wonder if they would've been stuck with trump
OnDoutside
(19,837 posts)Reckoned they could have stopped Trump if they had them.
FarCenter
(19,429 posts)However, each state should have a number proportional to the number of registered Democrats in that state, and the superdelegates must be chosen from elected state and federal officeholders, rather than people in various party positions.
meow2u3
(24,688 posts)provided only Democrats get to run in Democratic primaries.
OnDoutside
(19,837 posts)Jim Lane
(11,175 posts)I don't think the party should defer improving its rules until 50+ legislatures have amended their ballot access laws.
leftofcool
(19,460 posts)oasis
(48,923 posts)
jmowreader
(50,072 posts)whopis01
(3,412 posts)greeny2323
(590 posts)There are good reasons to have superdelegates, but I'd be fine if they were removed. The standard person on the street, I think, views them negatively so it would be a decent PR move to get rid of them.
And it would end the constant nagging about them, which is so tiring to listen to.
uponit7771
(89,934 posts)... but if not then hell naw.
StevieM
(10,489 posts)were ever going to be used to deny Bernie Sanders the nomination.
Bernie was the one who tried to get the SDs to give him the nomination, in spite of a 12 point loss.
It was already established in 2008 that HRC would never win the nomination that way when the SDs went for Obama.
StevieM
(10,489 posts)jalan48
(13,693 posts)whopis01
(3,412 posts)demmiblue
(36,489 posts)Especially when they pledge their allegiance/vote to a candidate before the official nomination of our candidate.
Also, get rid of caucuses.
Sienna86
(2,144 posts)Now, we need more Democrats to join in on this.
marble falls
(53,785 posts)the sixties to guarantee PoC a chance to be represented at the convention, but this purpose has been subverted.
former9thward
(30,534 posts)They were an invention to try and correct the electoral disasters of the 1972 and 1980 elections.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superdelegate
marble falls
(53,785 posts)Origins
After the 1968 Democratic National Convention, at which pro-Vietnam War liberal Hubert Humphrey was nominated for the presidency despite not running in a single primary election, 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.[12] A commission headed by South Dakota Senator George McGovern and Minnesota Representative Donald M. Fraser 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.[12] 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.[12] 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 resulting in landslide defeats.[12] 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.[12]
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.[13] A new 70-member commission headed by Governor of North Carolina 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.[13]
Following a series of meetings held from August 1981 to February 1982, the Hunt Commission issued a report which recommended the set aside of unelected and unpledged delegate slots for Democratic members of Congress and for state party chairs and vice chairs (so-called "superdelegates" .[13] 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 for the 1984 election, the number of superdelegates was set 14%. Over time this percentage has gradually increased, until by 2008 the percentage stands at approximately 20% of total delegates to the Democratic Party nominating convention.[14]
former9thward
(30,534 posts)Super Delegates did not exist in the 60s.
Gore1FL
(20,846 posts)There is a useful purpose for having state delegate seats for elected membership and party officials outside of the normal delegate selection process. The issue I see is that their are simply too many of them and their endorsements count in the delegate totals far too early in the game.
So have superdelegates, but:
1> have less,
2> select who will actually gets the seats after the state's caucus/primary is held, and
3> there needs to be some sort mitigation process to keep the process honest and the party unified in the off-chance, the superdelegates actually change the nominee.
PatsFan87
(368 posts)in states like New York.
TomCADem
(17,342 posts)...at least for large top 25 states. I can understand a caucus in a small state, but a large state? That just disenfranchises Democrats.
Raine
(30,211 posts)the Democratic party needs to be democratic and not controlled by the elites.
Not Ruth
(3,613 posts)Everyone has a chance, everyone wins,