Then comes the cut. In the vast majority of districts — all but those small precincts that have a tiny number of delegates up for grabs — the viability threshold is 15 percent. Any candidate above 15 percent is deemed viable, and their supporters are locked in. (That also applies to “uncommitted,” by the way. Caucus-goers who want to see the first alignment goes before picking their candidate may need to strategically line up with a non-viable campaign in order to remain eligible to switch.)

For voters who have picked a candidate who doesn’t meet the threshold, they can either switch to a viable candidate or hope to recruit enough people to make their candidate viable. That might be possible if they are between 10 percent and 15 percent, but it’s unlikely if they are significantly lower.

After all the switching comes a second count, known as the “final alignment.” Each candidates’ supporters are tallied, and any candidate at 15 percent or above is eligible to earn delegates to the state convention later this year. The number of delegates at stake is fixed going into the caucus — it’s based roughly on the performance of recent Democratic candidates in the precinct — and the chairperson uses the final alignment count to calculate the equivalent number of delegates each candidate has won from that precinct.

The Vote (and Delegate) Count

In past caucuses, the state delegate equivalents were the only numbers provided to the public. But after a near-photo finish between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders in 2016, reforms were adopted aimed at increasing transparency. Now, the state Democratic Party will be releasing all three metrics: the raw votes from the first and final alignments, and the state delegate equivalents.

If you’re watching television at home or following the returns on websites like POLITICO, you’ll see a winner proclaimed based on the traditional metric: state delegate equivalents. That includes The Associated Press, the news service of record for elections for most observers.

“Ultimately, we think that the state delegate equivalents are the most directly tied to the way that the Democrats pick their nominee,” Julie Pace, the AP’s Washington bureau chief, told POLITICO in an interview last month.

But already some candidates are signaling instead that they’ll highlight the first alignment raw vote, since it’s likely to be most favorable for them. That includes lower-polling candidates like Tom Steyer, who is in the low-single-digits in the polls and unlikely to be viable in most caucus precincts.