After losing New York, Bernie Sanders could now conceivably beat Hillary Clinton in every remaining primary and still come up short for the Democratic nomination.
Taking into account the latest results, Sanders must now win over 73 percent of the remaining delegates going forward. This means that Clinton could lose every single remaining state and still beat Sanders, due to the proportional allocation of delegates in the Democratic primary.
After hearing the results of the New York primary, Sanders unexpectedly left the campaign and abruptly flew from Pennsylvania to Burlington, Vt., claiming he need to “get recharged.”
As the campaign plotted and re-strategized they decided to leave the travelling press corps behind in Pennsylvania until the Sanders charter plane decides to return.
Going into New York, Sanders was 210 pledged delegates behind Clinton. Now her lead has grown by 33. But the Sanders campaign remains confident they can do well in the coming weeks, despite their huge disadvantage.
Sanders campaign manager Jeff Weaver explained that the Vermont senator should be able to compensate in the California primary, which has 475 delegates at stake, as well as in in the Oregon, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota and Indiana primaries. Pointing to the Northeast, Weaver said it was possible for Sanders to compete in all of these states.
“No, I don’t think you have to win all of them,” Weaver replied when asked if his campaign was now in “must win territory” during an interview on MSNBC directly following the loss.
The campaign manager went on to stipulate that Pennsylvania would be “very important” for their campaign and that the biggest day of their campaign will be June 7, when California and New Jersey vote.
While the Sanders campaign claims that they can pick up delegates in the upcoming states, Weaver also argued that neither candidate will reach the necessary 2,383 pledged delegates before the Philadelphia convention and that the race will come down to superdelegates. But the vast majority of these are committed to Clinton.
“They’re going to want to win in November and if the polling continues to show that Bernie Sanders is a much more popular in a general election,” Weavers said, defending his candidate. “In November only about a quarter of the population is Democrats and if you can’t create a coalition with independent voters you can’t win the White House, you can’t win the Senate, you can’t win additional seats in the House.”
Sanders is expected to leave Vermont Thursday to continue campaigning in Pennsylvania.
