Legal Commentary

Nevada Dems in Chaos at Clark County Convention

By Jeralyn

Update: It's a do-over. They will hold another one at later date.

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As noted earlier, the county delegates to the Nevada state convention were to be selected today. Those selected at local caucuses aren't binding. Both the Obama and Hillary camps did their best to get their delegates out today.

Most primaries and some Democratic caucuses are binding, meaning that national delegates won by the candidates must pledge to support them at the national convention this summer. Some high-profile caucuses, however, are just the beginning of a multistep process of selecting national convention delegates. In Nevada, precinct caucuses were held Jan. 19 to select delegates to county conventions this weekend. The county conventions will select delegates to the state convention in May.

The national delegates are elected at the state convention — the third step of the process. If all the delegates for each candidate show up at every step, the national delegates awarded Jan. 19 will remain unchanged. In Nevada, Obama won 13 delegates and Clinton won 12.

More...

It was a madhouse. 8,000 turned out at Bally's in Las Vegas. It was a chaotic scene. The early straw poll results were 1,320 for Clinton, 1,261 for Obama.

The process almost got suspended for 30 days.

Clark County Democrats suspended their convention just now, agreeing that the chaos was so extensive that a fair outcome could not be guaranteed. Democratic officials say the convention will remain in recess for up to 30 days to give the organization time to make the process more fair and orderly.

A few minutes later the Sun writes,"Oops, reports of suspension premature."

Stay tuned.

Full post as published by TalkLeft on February 23, 2008 (boomark / email).