Hillary Wins Iowa!

Another crack in that glass ceiling and here’s to many more firsts!

Congratulations to Hillary on her historic win in Iowa! Congratulations to Bernie as well for running such a spirited campaign in Iowa!

Yes, it was a very close and hard fought victory. But make no mistake about it, the dynamics of this race haven't changed. Realistically, the Sanders campaign needed an Iowa victory to change the narrative. A "virtual tie” wasn’t good enough.

And as the Cook Political Report explained, in its realistic analysis of demographics and delegate math, future contests are not looking favorable for Sanders.

cookpolitical.com/…

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Sanders demographic hurdle, after New Hampshire.

In poll after poll, Sanders's best group within the Democratic Party is liberal whites. Unfortunately for Sanders, Iowa and New Hampshire couldn't be much further on the extreme end of the party's demographic or ideological spectrum. According to our estimates, based on past exit polls and Census data, there is only one state where whites who self-identify as liberals make up a higher share of the Democratic primary electorate than Iowa and New Hampshire. You guessed it: Vermont. In fact, 98 percent of pledged Democratic delegates will come from states with lower shares of liberal whites than Iowa and New Hampshire. Just 447 of 4,051 pledged Democratic delegates - 11 percent - are tied to results in states or districts with higher shares of college-educated whites than New Hampshire. Moreover, just 13 percent of pledged Democratic delegates will be awarded in caucus states like Iowa, which as 2008 proved, tend to bring out more liberal participants than primaries.



In other words, if Sanders prevails narrowly in Iowa or New Hampshire, his support among liberal whites and in college towns - essentially Portlandia - would be entirely consistent with a scenario in which he also gets clobbered by Clinton nationally.

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And the Sanders delegate hurdle, after his Iowa loss.

The key takeaway from our model below: in order for Sanders to be "on track" to break even in pledged delegates nationally, he wouldn't just need to win Iowa and New Hampshire by a hair. He would need to win 70 percent of Iowa's delegates and 63 percent of New Hampshire's delegates. Early primary results can be misleading, but presidential primaries tend to follow clear patterns. In 2008, Super Tuesday produced a virtual tie for Democrats; Barack Obama edged Clinton 847 to 834 in delegates that day. But thanks to Obama's heavy backing from African-Americans and liberal whites, savvy number crunchers could discern that he was "on track" to build an insurmountable delegate lead in upcoming primaries like Maryland and Virginia. In other words, the race was already over. This time around, close finishes in Iowa and New Hampshire would be good news for Clinton.



Furthermore, even if Sanders did hit every delegate target on our scorecard below and won 50 percent of pledged delegates, he would be at a severe disadvantage heading into the Philadelphia convention because our model doesn't even take into account his severe superdelegate deficit.

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If the Sanders campaign couldn't win Iowa and even after factoring in its predicted victory in New Hampshire next week, a more demographically diverse Democratic electorate will be the norm and just like his very close loss in Iowa, that’s not good news for the Sanders campaign.

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x @CharlesMBlow BS needed a big IA win.

SC HRC 64% BS 24%

NV HRC 50% BS 27%

NC HRC 59% BS 26%

FL HRC 62% BS 24%

OH HRC 53% BS 37% — Mike kramer (@MikesPencil) February 2, 2016

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x BREAKING: Hillary Clinton wins Democratic caucuses in Iowa. — The Associated Press (@AP) February 2, 2016

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