A few days ago, Iowa completed its limited “recanvas”, which is a review of only the totals sent in by the individual caucuses to the Iowa Democratic Party. The result was that former South Bend major Pete Buttigieg’s lead over Senator Bernie Sanders in the “state delegate equivalent” count narrowed to a razor-thin margin: 563,207 to 563,127.
Two days ago, both campaigns requested a more comprehensive recount of selected caucuses:
The Sanders' campaign recount request targets 10 precincts, and argues that 1.6845 state delegate equivalents hang in the balance, well over the margin of Buttigieg's lead, according to a list of precincts shared by the state party.
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The Buttigieg's campaign's request is more expansive, requesting a recount in 54 precincts. At the heart of the Buttigieg recount request, which the campaign said it would withdraw if Sanders' campaign chose not to seek a recount, is that SDEs were incorrectly allocated in satellite caucuses, in which Sanders performed exceptionally well.
Today, the IDP announced that it will go ahead with the recount:
The Iowa Democratic Party announced Friday it will recount the caucus results of 23 precincts after the presidential campaigns of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and former South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg raised concerns over the tallies.
Sanders and Buttigieg requested recounts of 10 precincts and 54 precincts, respectively. The Iowa Democratic Party said it will review the results from all 10 of Sanders’s precincts and 14 of Buttigieg’s precincts, for a total of 23 precincts after an overlap.
What’s left unmentioned in the reports I could find is that the IDP obviously did not accept the Buttigieg campaign’s general argument against the satellite caucus delegate allocation, only approving recounts in a quarter of the caucuses they requested. With all of the Bernie campaign’s requests approved, I think this can end in only one way: Bernie wins the majority even on the state delegate equivalent metric, after handily winning on the popular vote metric.
On a final note: I find it highly hypocritical for someone to call for an abolition of the Electoral College but then have no problems with either “state delegate equivalents” in Iowa or superdelegates at the DNC convention.