The Texas state Democratic primary, with an intricate system of caucuses and primaries, strongly favors Illinois Senator Barack Obama.
Texas has one of the nation’s most complex systems of selecting delegates to the Democratic Convention. This system, enriched by Republican redistricting, now favors Senator Barack Obama from Illinois. With 193 pledged delegates at stake, the primary will only choose 126. The caucus system, where Obama has been extremely successful, will be held after the primary election on March 4th and deliver an additional 67 delegates.
- Independents: Any registered Texan voter can vote in Democratic Primary and independents strongly favor Obama. Ari Melber wrote in Feb 6th’s Huffington Post: “[Obama] won independents by large margins in most regions, including states in Clinton's column, such as Arizona…New Jersey…New York…California….[and] swing state…Missouri…”
- Democrats/Republicans – Party registration does not exist in Texas as stated by Texas Secretary of State Phil Wilson: “One becomes ‘affiliated’ with a party by voting in a party's primary and the affiliation lasts [only] for that primary year.” Who is a Republican or Democrat? Last year’s Republican may not be this year’s Democrat as illustrated in the Black/Hispanic Voter results below, which favors Obama.
- Black/Hispanic Voter – According to the 2004 CNN/NEP exit poll results “Bush [received] 49% of the Latino vote” and the Texas population is “34% Hispanic.” Eric Black of the Minnesota Post states: “In the total voting-age population of Texas, Hispanics outnumber blacks by...3-1.” However, “almost all black Texans are citizens, but 30% of Hispanic Texans are not. Among black Texan citizens of voting age, 71% are registered to vote, as opposed to 59% for Hispanics. In 2004…82% of black Texan registered voters turned out to vote, compared with 71% of Hispanic Texan registered voters.”
- Delegate Distribution – The quirky Texas system allocates delegates based upon the state’s 31 senatorial districts but delegate distribution varies between districts. As stated in the New York News and Features on February 27th: delegates are distributed “…depending on the number of Democratic votes the district cast for president in 2004 and governor in 2006.” This tends to favor Obama as stated in NYNF: “So…Houston and…Dallas, which are represented by the only African-Americans in the Texas Senate, plus…Austin, will award a combined 21 delegates next week. In contrast, the six districts [that] have Latino senators have a total of just 22 delegates.”
- Primary/Caucus – The Texas Two-Step is a dual voting system: a standard primary election that runs from February 19th until March 4th; then an evening of caucusing for the selection of additional delegates. This system favors Obama where he has held a decisive edge in Caucuses (64% - 32% average.) In On The Road To 2008 Kirk Dorffer said on Feb 10: “There have been 11 caucuses…With the exception of Nevada, Obama has won every one of them.” Excluding Nevada (45%) and early multi-candidate Iowa (38%), Obama has consistently garnered 60-80% of the caucus votes.
- Vote Early and Often – With Texas’ dual system, concerned voters get to vote once in the primary for the 126 delegates and then again in the caucus for 67 additional delegates (not including the 32 super-delegates.) Early voting started on February 19th as reported by KTRK TV 13 in Houston. “…at a polling place on West Gray…The precinct judge says he's never seen so many people…Voting began at 8am and by 8:30am, [many] people had already cast their ballot….” Ideological voters tend to favor Obama while Black voters out vote Hispanics 8:7 as shown above.
The copyright of the article Obama Should Win Texas Primary in US Elections is owned by Frank W. Hardy. Permission to republish Obama Should Win Texas Primary in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
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