Monday I told you how the West Virginia Republican Party selects delegates to the national convention. Today, I break down the process for the Democratic Party. It’s different from the GOP, but like the Republicans, it gets complicated.
West Virginia will send 37 delegates (29 pledged delegates and eight superdelegates) to the Democratic National Convention July 25-28 in Philadelphia. Unlike the Republicans, the candidates for those delegate positions will not be on the ballot in the state’s May 10 primary.
The Democratic Party switched to a caucus process to choose delegates after the 2008 election, when over 400 candidates ran for the positions. State Democratic Party chair Belinda Biafore said county clerks and voters complained, justifiably, that it made the ballot unwieldy.
Additionally, Biafore says some voters were skipping over the delegate portion of the ballot because it was just too long, so now the selection process is different.
It began last weekend when Democrats held 55 separate county conventions and chose 1,526 delegates who are invited to the state convention June 10-11 in Charleston, where 29 of the 37 national convention delegates will be chosen.
At the state convention delegates will split into three meetings, one for each of the state’s congressional districts, where they will elect a total of 20 national convention delegates. The party executive committee elects six more at-large delegates. The party uses the at-large slots to ensure that various groups, such as veterans, minorities, seniors, people with disabilities, the LGBT community and others, are represented.
Three additional pledged party leaders (typically the Democratic candidate for governor or other leading elected officials) round out the 29 pledged delegates.
Biafore points out that the 29 must be apportioned according to the popular vote. For example, if Bernie Sanders garners 70 percent of the popular vote here he would receive 14 congressional district delegates, four at-large delegates and two pledged party delegates for a total of 20 of 29.
The party also has eight slots for non-pledged party leaders and elected officials, commonly known as superdelegates. They will be Biafore, party vice-chair Chris Regan, party national committeeman Pat Maroney and committeewoman Elaine Harris, U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin, Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin, State Treasurer John Perdue and Secretary of State Natalie Tennant.
Those eight superdelegates are not bound to the popular election results and can change their mind about which candidate to support at any point in the process, but the 29 pledged party delegates will head to Philadelphia committed to a particular candidate.
Biafore believes Democrats should be more familiar with the process since this is the second time through.
“We did it for the first time four years ago and it worked out very well,” Biafore said. “Once people understood what it was and that their popular vote did factor into the equation then they were fine with it.”