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Clinton Camp: Seat All Delegates With Full Votes

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May 30, 2008 2:25 PM

ABC News' Eloise Harper reports: Clinton campaign senior advisors held a conference call Friday morning in advance of the much anticipated Democratic National Committee rules and bylaws committee meeting on Saturday at a Washington DC hotel.

Read more about the meeting HERE and HERE.

The ruling of the once-obscure Democratic committee is crucial for the fate of the Clinton campaign because it will determine how many convention delegates will be awarded from Michigan and Florida -- states won by Clinton.

It is also likely the outcome of the meeting will increase the number of delegates a candidate needs to achieve before securing the nomination.

The Clinton campaign has long demanded that all of the disputed pledged delegates from Florida and Michigan be seated in full with full votes at the party's convention in Denver this August.

Clinton strategists were asked repeatedly the question on everybody's mind: What happens if you don't get what you want?

"We anticipate that the committee will seat the delegates from Michigan and Florida," Clinton campaign senior advisor Harold Ickes said to reporters. Ickes, along with Clinton campaign advisor Tina Flournoy, are both longtime members of the 30-member DNC rules and bylaws panel.

Clinton campaign communications director Howard Wolfson, after receiving numerous different variations of the question, said, "You and others can ask this question in many different ways, but the answer is going to be the same.  We are hopeful and expectant that the committee in its wisdom is going to do the right thing.”

Presumably the campaign has a plan in place if their demands are not met, however the campaign has refused to say whether they would support an appeal of the decision. Under party rules, a challenge of the committee's decision Saturday could be taken all the way to the credentials committee at the Democratic party's convention this August.

There has been no official announcements about where Sen. Hillary Clinton will be Tuesday night after the last primary contests in Montana and South Dakota.

Wolfson did comment on the recent comments by  Rev. Michael Pfleger, who mocked Clinton in Sen. Barack Obama's church Sunday, saying, "Sen. Clinton has twin goals going forward one is to secure the nomination the other is to bring the party together, regardless of who the nominee is. She has articulated both those goals now time and time again, and its frankly why we were so disappointed to see the comments of Rev. Pfleger yesterday.

"We are all I believe attempting to bring the party together and when you have that kind of divisive and hateful language it is counterproductive to those efforts and we were disappointed last night when we first heard about about is and we were specifically disappointed that Sen. Obama did not fully reject Rev. Pfleger's despicable comments about Sen. Clinton," Wolfson said.

May 30, 2008 in Bush, George W., Tancredo, Tom | Permalink | User Comments (290)

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"we were specifically disappointed that Sen. Obama did not fully reject Rev. Pfleger's despicable comments about Sen. Clinton,"

And Hillary never apologized to Barack or his family for hoping out loud that he would be assassinated so she could slide in and be the nominee.

The hypocrisy from the Clinton campaign is DISGUSTING

Posted by: Laura | May 30, 2008 2:39:21 PM

The party will never be brought together after the things that have happened. Especially the band of hate spewing fools BO calls his spiritual advisors! As in spreading the spirit of hate!

Posted by: rockthebleachers | May 30, 2008 2:46:01 PM

Laura
It is quite clear that Senator Clinton's reference was to do with the time frame of primaries.The whole world knows it ,it is better if you woke up from Obama dreamland and realised it as well.This inference you make is reprehensible and disgusting.

Posted by: independent voice | May 30, 2008 2:46:29 PM

Hillary is being a spoiled brat. She is destroying our party because of her huge, unsatisfied ego.

So much for her losing gracefully. She's going to be a screaming, crying baby out it.

Posted by: Bill | May 30, 2008 2:47:40 PM

Obama supporters are equally filled with hate and divisiveness as his campaign and his close confidants and mentors in Chicago.

Posted by: dems are disgusting | May 30, 2008 2:48:26 PM

Is Hillary looking for another "Reject and Denounce".... geeze the man already made a statement saying that those were not his own views and that they fueled a backwards rhetoric and that he was very disappointed. Damn, Hillary... get out of the race and HELP OUT!!!!!! The Democratic party needs her help to win... not her complaining about delegates that she herself agreed shouldn't be seated.

Posted by: matt | May 30, 2008 2:49:41 PM

hey t.
how come everything Hillary says has different meaning other than the words coming from her mouth while Obama is painted with words coming from someone else mouth?

Posted by: reality check | May 30, 2008 2:49:52 PM

In my eye, Barack Obama has bent over backwards trying to sympathize with Hillary, offering praise and admiration throughout this campaign, and has avoided direct attacks on Hillary.

For her campaign managers to show disappointment for Barack not to come to the aid of the damsel-in-distress yet again hardly presents an image of her as a strong, self-sustaining leader.

Does the Clinton campaign really need Barack to defend her? Is she unable to fend her own political jabs?

Posted by: Alfred | May 30, 2008 2:54:14 PM

^^Hillary is being a spoiled brat. She is destroying our party because of her huge, unsatisfied ego.
So much for her losing gracefully. She's going to be a screaming, crying baby out it.^^

You mean to say that she shouldn't work as hard as she can to win, cuz Florida and Michigan can give her the nomination, if all the votes are counted, that is. She should just hand the nomination to Obamarama just cuz YOU say so, just cuz YOU want Obamarama to win???

Posted by: Mr. Incredible | May 30, 2008 2:54:47 PM

We all realize this guy is a jerk.

What I don't get is Barack Obama's congregation. Why do we see them behind these jerks, clapping and cheering this crap spewing from their own pulpit?

Why aren't they lining up to walk out the door instead? Would Barack Obama allow his daughters to hear this disgusting personal attack, or would he walk them out the door immediately?

I've never heard a Christian sermon where the paster directs ridicule at another human being.
Beyond that, she's also a sitting US Senator and former First Lady of America. Has he no respect for our elected officials and their families?
It seems like these people really do hate America and white people.

Can someone from the black community please help me understand why I would ever want to be in the same Party with "Christians" like these, who are members of the same church as Obama?
Sorry, maybe I am a racist, but these "Christians" disgust me.

Posted by: Jan | May 30, 2008 2:55:31 PM

Florida I can buy. Michigan makes no sense. Her claiming Obama should receive no delegates for following the rules there when she said she would and then didn't makes no sense. If anything Obama should get delegates from Michigan and Hillary should not. It makes no sense other than some type of sick, twisted logic that we don't need four more years of in the White House.

Posted by: jay | May 30, 2008 2:55:34 PM

Alfred take those rose colored glasses off!! He only try to praise her when he saw that slamming her was upsetting the women folk!

Posted by: rockthebleachers | May 30, 2008 2:56:22 PM

If Hillary's campaign wants unity, why not reach a compromise that her husband has endorsed, 50 percent? There has to be some consequence for breaking the rules, or who will abide by them next time? Since she clearly stated at the time of the transgression "Florida and Michigan won't count," it's pretty obvious that she is more concerned with winning that doing what is just and fair. It is just sad to see her pander to FL and MI voters, most of whom were just victims in this. If I lived in one of those states, I'd campaign against the scoundrels who moved up the date in total disregard of the rules and caused this mess. FL and MI, I feel your pain, but unfortunately, Hillary is like the girl in high school who never liked you until you got a new car or started dating the quarterback.

Posted by: louielouie | May 30, 2008 2:56:39 PM

Clinton campaign communications director Howard Wolfson, after receiving numerous different variations of the question, said, "You and others can ask this question in many different ways, but the answer is going to be the same. We are hopeful and expectant that the committee in its wisdom is going to do the right thing.”

The "right thing"? Yeah Wolfson has finally wanted to do the right thing...

Wolfson wants OBAMA!

...because the right thing wouldn't be a full seating of an election where there was only one candidate. These people are a joke...and the embodiment of everything wrong with American politics...with America for that matter...get them out.

Posted by: dl | May 30, 2008 2:57:27 PM

      "The Clinton campaign has long demanded that all of
      the disputed pledged delegates from Florida and
      Michigan be seated in full with full votes at the party's
      convention in Denver this August."

Gotta figure the Clintons' purpose here is twofold.

First point would have to be an attempt to "legitimize" her argument that she's won "the popular vote".  That one's needing some serious shoring up.

Second one would be to try to provide some salable justification for her decision to stay in the race clear to Denver (and possibly even beyond).  "I want it all" probably ain't gonna cut it over the long haul; the PR on that truth would be just too negative to go the distance without refrigeration.  She needs something that at least SOUNDS a little more lofty.

Posted by: Lee C.   ―   U.S.A.    | May 30, 2008 2:58:56 PM

I think the DNC should punish Hillary for using this and the voters of Michigan anf Florida in the way they have. They have made their potential votes nuclear because they were based on a population that was the same as every other state where Obama didn't come and meet them...where they initially had the same numbers but as soon as obama came...he almost always beat her...and in every state they went from voting for the woman they knew as first lady for 15 years to either tying or voting for Obama.... but that was only after they met the caniddates...the numbers don't lie. These states really shouldn't be considered since there is a distinct difference between states where they actually had them come and meet the candidates and these beauty contests.

Hillary should be tacked back from other states for screwing with the importance of the people's voices... she embodies what Scott McLellan says has infected Washington and the White house for the past 15 years... since she was in the white house the first time.

It's all about her and not the country or the voters.

Divisive, divisive, divisive ...all in the name of power.

Posted by: dl | May 30, 2008 3:03:39 PM

If you take your name off the ballot, Voluntarily, it means 100% that you do not want to be voted for, and you forfeit your candidacy in that election.


Now you come back a cry baby to get help from Mommy in the House. Even she helps you to push for your delegates, you still forfeits your candidacy in MI.

Posted by: stack | May 30, 2008 3:03:55 PM

All delegates will be seated. And if not, HRC will win the nomination in Denver.
It is clear that Obama is unelectable, the DNC just has to figure out how to rule that she wins on a "technicality" so they don't lose face with the Obama camp.

Watch and learn.
All the vitriol from Obama's camp won't change what everyone knows -- he is weak and unelectable. Period.

Posted by: BZ | May 30, 2008 3:07:26 PM

ditto, former dem in chicago.

Posted by: Boneheaded, Chicago | May 30, 2008 3:09:14 PM

stack

it wasn't Obama that was the cry baby...remember.

and I think it is Hillary that is whining now...you know not when it mattered for the voters...but now when it matters to her.

but then again she has never been one to put anything ahead of herself has she.

Name me once she took a hit for anything... you can't. Everything she has ever done is tactical...including her team planning how the delegates would be counted...only problem it didn't work out like they planned.

She is a bad caniddate at this point... she might be good at winning stuff (but even here in her element the one demographic that was supposed to be her strong suit...she lost)

and she plays gross politics...

and cries about it when she is losing.

Funny that darfur, the soldiers, the kids starving, her daughter speaking...

nothing makes her cry...but then when she herself is losing...she cries.

She isn't the "mama" as you like to portray.

Posted by: dl | May 30, 2008 3:10:27 PM

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