Clinton Hints at Luring Obama’s Pledged Delegates

A battle is looming for snatching pledged delegates from rival presidential candidates.

With Democratic candidate Barack Obama leading in the delegate count and Hillary Clinton’s turnaround prospects looking increasingly dim, the Clinton camp apparently seeks to lure pledged delegates away from Obama in the Democratic convention.

Clinton hinted at this in an interview with Time magazine. She said several times that pledged delegates are often talked about, but that every delegate is expected to exercise independent judgment.

A senior member of the Clinton camp echoed the opinion in Politico, saying if the close race between two candidates continues until right near the party convention, either of them will seek to snatch pledged delegates from the other.

Pledged delegates refer to 3,253 delegates allocated to each candidate according to the results of the primaries. Contrary to the 795 super delegates, pledged delegates are known to be unable to change their candidate.

Legal experts in the Democratic Party, however, largely agree that though pledged delegates are morally obliged to cast their votes in the party convention for their original candidate, they have no legal responsibility to do so.

A lawyer specializing in politics told the Dong-A Ilbo correspondent in Washington that pledged delegates are not legally obliged to support the candidate in whose name they were elected.

In the 1980 Democratic convention, Senator Edward Kennedy stirred controversy by seeking to undo President Jimmy Carter’s delegates, leading to a revision in nomination rules in 1982.

But the revised rule also said delegates elected to the convention pledged to a presidential candidate shall in all good conscience reflect the sentiments of those who elected them. The controversy gave birth to super delegates.

If the battle for pledged delegates does occur, serious repercussions are expected for the Democratic Party. Against this backdrop, some have already criticized the Clinton camp, citing the Biblical maxim “Thou shall not covet your neighbor’s wife.”

One pledged delegate for Obama told MSNBC that he will support Clinton only when Obama asks to do so.

Many Democrats, however, warn that if this close contest extends to the party convention on Aug. 25, an internal feud will escalate with all delegates being targets for snatching.

This worry has prompted senior party officials to suggest an early nomination through an unofficial convention.

Rather than waiting until the official convention, they want the party’s 795 super delegates to convene on June 3, when all primaries and caucuses end. That is the only way to win the presidential election against the Republican candidate, they said.

sechepa@donga.com