DES MOINES, Iowa — Bernie Sanders’s campaign says its internal vote count showed the Vermont senator winning the Iowa caucuses, though the state’s Democratic Party has released no results.
According to the campaign, Sanders won 29.66% of the vote in nearly 40% of precincts in the first Democratic nominating contest. Not all precinct locations were included in Sanders’s numbers. The statement also showed former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg in second place at 24.59% of the vote, Sen. Elizabeth Warren in third at 21.24% of the vote, and former Vice President Joe Biden at 12.37% of the vote. Sen. Amy Klobuchar placed fifth at 11%.
The campaign released the following statement:
“We recognize that this does not replace the full data from the Iowa Democratic Party, but we believe firmly that our supporters worked too hard for too long to have the results of that work delayed,” Sanders senior adviser Jeff Weaver said.
The Sanders campaign called the caucus a “failure of the Iowa Democratic Party” and said it was releasing the numbers “in the interest of full transparency.”
The move is unprecedented on a caucus day that ended in chaos and confusion, but the Sanders campaign believed it had no choice, as a number of its competitors tried spinning the night in their favor.
Sanders’s numbers should by no means be taken as a definitive record, given the number of issues reported at numerous precinct locations and problems with the Iowa Democratic Party’s digital caucus app.
Other candidates such as Buttigieg and Warren claimed victory Monday evening, saying their internal numbers showed a successful effort.
