Clinton camp enraged by Michigan, Florida delegate solution
By Steven Thomma | McClatchy Newspapers
WASHINGTON — Just as Democrats headed toward the final votes of the long primary season with hopes of wrapping up the nomination, a party panel Saturday triggered what could be a bitter fight lasting through the summer and on to the Democratic National Convention.
The Rules and Bylaws Committee of the Democratic National Committee voted to restore delegate votes to Florida and Michigan, two states that had been stripped of all their votes for holding primaries too early in violation of party rules.
The panel essentially reduced the two states' votes by half, voting to seat all the delegates from both states, then give each a half vote.
But it also reallocated the delegates from Michigan, trying to remedy what members called a "flawed" primary where Clinton triumphed easily but Obama was not on the ballot.
Following a formula that tried to divine the wishes of voters by using exit polls as well as write in votes for Obama that weren't counted at the time, the panel took four delegates away from Clinton, and gave them plus all of the state's uncommitted delegates to Obama.
The result had little impact on the nomination battle, giving Clinton a small net gain on Obama but failing to dent his triple digit lead in delegates.
But it outraged Clinton supporters, many of whom stormed out of the meeting. And it prompted Clinton herself to tell her point man on the panel, Harold Ickes, that she reserved the right to take a challenge to the decision to the party's credentials committee later this summer and perhaps to the Democratic National Convention in Denver in August.
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