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This Tuesday evening Hillary Clinton might be conceding the delegate race to Barack Obama and effectively suspending her campaign. While she will not officially drop her bid, she may tonight concede that Obama has the delegates needed to secure the nomination.
Note: This story has since been disputed by the Clinton campaign: Report from Yahoo News:
WASHINGTON - Hillary Rodham Clinton will concede Tuesday night that Barack Obama has the delegates to secure the Democratic nomination, campaign officials said, effectively ending her bid to be the nation’s first female president.
Obama is 40 delegates shy of clinching the nomination, but he is widely expected to make up the difference Tuesday with superdelegate support and votes in South Dakota and Montana. Once he reaches the magic number of 2,118, Clinton will acknowledge that he has secured the necessary delegates to be the nominee.
The former first lady will stop short of formally suspending or ending her race in her speech in New York City.
She will pledge to continue to speak out on issues like health care. But for all intents and purposes, the two senior officials said, the campaign is over.
Most campaign staff will be let go and will be paid through June 15, said the officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to divulge her plans.
The advisers said Clinton has made a strategic decision to not formally end her campaign, giving her leverage to negotiate with Obama on various matters including a possible vice presidential nomination for her. She also wants to press him on issues he should focus on in the fall, such as health care.
Universal health care, Clinton’s signature issue as first lady in the 1990s, was a point of dispute between Obama and the New York senator during their epic nomination fight.
Clinton was at home in Chappaqua, N.Y., with her husband, former President Clinton, and was placing calls to friends and supporters.
On NBC’s “Today Show,” Clinton campaign chairman Terry McAuliffe said that once Obama gets the majority of convention delegates, “I think Hillary Clinton will congratulate him and call him the nominee.”
She will not officially end her campaign, mainly for the reason of negotiating debt payoff perhaps with Obama. If she officially suspends it, she will have no more leverage.
However, this is major news in that she has may concede him the nomination, or at least she might when she speaks tonight.
More as this story develops and, of course, the South Dakota and Montana primary results starting at 8pm eastern. We’ll also have Hillary Clinton’s speech and Obama’s eventual victory speech in full later tonight.
Polls close:
South Dakota - 8pm eastern
Montana - 9pm eastern
Update
The new Associated Press tally has Obama now hitting the 2,118 delegate mark thanks to the deluge of superdelegates committing today, story from Breitbart:
WASHINGTON (AP) - Barack Obama effectively clinched the Democratic presidential nomination Tuesday, based on an Associated Press tally of convention delegates, becoming the first black candidate ever to lead his party into a fall campaign for the White House.
Campaigning on an insistent call for change, Obama outlasted former first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton in a historic race that sparked record turnout in primary after primary, yet exposed deep racial divisions within the party.
The AP tally was based on public commitments from delegates as well as more than a dozen private commitments. It also included a minimum number of delegates Obama was guaranteed even if he lost the final two primaries in South Dakota and Montana later in the day.
The 46-year-old first-term senator will face Sen. John McCain of Arizona in the fall campaign to become the 44th president.
Clinton was ready to concede that her rival had amassed the delegates needed to triumph, according to officials in her campaign. These officials said the New York senator did not intend to suspend or end her candidacy in a speech Tuesday night in New York. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they had not been authorized to divulge her plans.
This whole thing will be sorted out over the next 24 hours with the primaries ending and the final superdelegates committing. I’m thinking that by tomorrow, Obama will have enough reason to ask for Hillary’s succession based on support from the Democratic Party and the media.
Clinton supporter/surrogate Terry McAuliffe says she will conced if Obama hits 2,118, from The Hill:
Terry McAuliffe, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s (N.Y.) campaign chairman, said Tuesday that he believes that, once Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.) reaches the number of delegates necessary to clinch the Democratic presidential nomination, the former first lady “will congratulate him and call him the nominee.â€
McAuliffe, who appeared on NBC’s Today Show, touted Clinton’s success in the popular vote when anchor Meredith Vieira interrupted to say: “But, then again, it is not about the votes, it is about that number, 2,118 delegates,†to which he replied “sure.â€
Vieira followed up, asking “If Barack Obama reaches that number today or tomorrow, do you believe that Senator Clinton is prepared to concede?â€
McAuliffe responded: “Yes, I think if Senator Obama gets the number, I think Hillary Clinton will congratulate him and call him the nominee.â€
The Associated Press reported that Clinton would concede Tuesday night. However, the campaign quickly released a statement saying that the article is incorrect and that Clinton would not concede the nomination this evening.
Obama is expected to reach the threshold of 2118 delegates as early as Tuesday with a combination of new superdelegates and pledged delegates won in the South Dakota and Montana primaries, but McAuliffe noted that “we haven’t gotten to that number yet.â€
I’m thinking that her campaign retracted any statement about concession to prevent a loss in South Dakota, which she’s expected to win tonight quite handily.
More tonight as it develops along with primary results starting around 8pm eastern.
(1 votes, average: 5 out of 5)
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I don’t know about the rest of you but I for one will be singing the DING DONG WICKED WITCH song and will most definitely be intently watchin’ the news tonight. I know alot of people seem to have thought that throught this election, a Hillary ticket was the best chance at a Republican win…..I think it’s actually quite the opposite. I think a lot of people voted for Hillary just because they refused to vote for Obama for various reasons in the first place. I see those votes easily going to McCain as he’s probably a pretty viable a candidate in the eyes of liberals in my opinion. To me he seems more left of center than right to begin with so the way I see it, the Dems still get thier choice and in the end I don’t see it being Obama.
Interestingly enough yet anough premature AP report has come out:
“Barack Obama has effectively clinched the Democratic nomination, The Associated Press reported Tuesday afternoon, even as Hillary Clinton’s campaign rigorously battled reports that she would concede the race Tuesday night.”
So umm…is the AP deciding the election with premature reporting as they usually attempt to do? Seems like the power of media persuasion these days is pretty sickening.
While I can’t stand Hillary, I am baffled by the media’s love affair with Obama, and the amount of things that haven’t garned much attention. They’ve let him get away with nearly everything. Once he offers some explanation as to what ever the scandal of the day is, the media doesn’t bring it back up again it seems like. His problematic views and life choices seem to constantly get forgiven and burried by the press……
Nate, CNN and FOX both report now that she won’t concede.
http://elections.foxnews......s-options/
http://www.cnn.com/2008/P.....index.html
Realist, I see that now, seems to be conflicting reports coming out. I’m guessing that the Clinton campaign did not want to disenfranchise her supporters in South Dakota, where she might win by 25 points or so. Therefore, they denied the AP report about any concessions.
We’ll know later tonight though I’m betting she’ll concede something and Obama will be hitting the 2,118 number soon. The AP says he has already based on the superdelegates they’re expecting to commit.
This is all presumptive for now on the part of the media, I hate getting sucked into the confusion. I’ll be back around 8pm eastern.
Angry American,
You are right. The Wright controversy was covered for only 3 months or something like that.
Tell me Angry American,
What will Obama do if hes president that makes you not like him?
Well, Bob Beckel was on Fox News this morning saying he thought Hillary was holding on because of a rumor that something big is coming out against Michelle Obama tomorrow.
Here’s the video, I ran across it on a yahoo news discussion board:
http://www.redlasso.com/C.....4b819b7afa
Here we go with another scandal……..
I’ve heard people talking about the “smoking gun” scandal that someone is holding until tomorrow….anyone know what it is?
No Matt, Beckel alluded, well, I guess he actually accused the RNC of being the ones who are releasing it, but there’s not a hint of anything on rnc.org. I did notice when the commentator on Fox asked if it was more damaging than a college thesis he said “significantly”. Also there is a link on that same page I listed above to another video where someone named “Roger” was talking to Geraldo on the same subject and had quite a bit more to say. I won’t repeat it all, but the title of it (if you want to go back and look) is “Whitey”, and he said his information came from a high level in the Clinton campaign who called it a “bomb”.
Simply put Frank if he chooses Hillary as a running mate as she has said as of today she is open to it…. I will extremely dislike Obama. Right now I don’t like him do to his socialist views and his lack of experience. To stress my point if he chooses Hillary, he defeats his campaign stump as the candidate of change hould he choose her because as he has staed she is more of the same. He then is a liar and a hypocrite. You can’t call yourself the candidate of change when your running with the old vangaurd of Washington and then expect to get anything done in the process. Should he choose her then they are both in for thier own sakes and more for the sake of the party than for the sake of the people in my point of view. Haven’t we had enough party politics? Bush squandered his 8 years with a republican majority in the congress and senate up until this last cycle of elections, Obama would just do the same.
As for the Michelle Obama bomb, it’s already out, on the radio earlier they said she was speaking from the church pulpit about “whitey” but it hasn’t been aired as of yet that I know of.
I still think McCain is going to get elected with or without Hillary as Obama’s running mate, he would do wiser to run with someone else.
Haha, I haven’t heard anything about Mrs. Obama talking about ‘whitey’, lol… but I wouldn’t put it past her. It seems like every time I hear/read her on any type of media, she is doing a discredit to Mr. Obama’s campaign. Maybe she should just quiet down until the elections are over. It would definately help Mr. Obama out a little.