Hillary Clinton declared victory in what officials described as the tighest challenge in Iowa caucus history, but a spokesperson for Bernie Sanders insisted Tuesday that the contest is far from settled.
With all but one precinct reporting, Sanders trailed the former secretary of state 694.49 state delegate equivalents to 699.57, with a roughly 49.9% to 49.5% split, according to the Iowa Democratic Party. The sparring partners remained locked in a virtual tie in Iowa early Tuesday, but both candidates remained confident in the pivotal early-voting state’s caucuses.
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“The results tonight are the closest in Iowa Democratic caucus history,” said Iowa Democratic Party Chairman Andy McGuire in a statement early Tuesday.
The Clinton campaign proclaimed victory after the results showed the delegate gap larger than the 2.28 delegates available from the final unreported Des Moines precinct.
“I am a progressive who gets things done for people,” she said. “We have to be united when it is all said and done. We have to be united when it is all said and done against a Republican vision and candidates who would drive us apart and divide us. That’s not who we are, my friends.”
Sanders, after arriving in New Hampshire, didn’t rule out a challenge to the Iowa vote count.
“Honestly, we just got off the plane, and we don’t know enough to say anything about it,” he said early Tuesday.
Speaking to reporters on his charted plane flight, he called on the Democratic party to release a raw vote count in Iowa, the Guardian reports.
“I honestly don’t know what happened. I know there are some precincts that have still not reported. I can only hope and expect that the count will be honest,” he said. “I have no idea. Did we win the popular vote? I don’t know, but as much information as possible should be made available.”
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Sanders’ campaign director, Jeff Weaver, told reporters he did not “anticipate we are going to contest” specific results but hoped there would be an investigation into what happened, according to the Guardian.
Sanders contended at an electrified rally at his Iowa headquarters that his strong showing “sent a very powerful message to the political establishment, to the economic establishment and, by the way, to the media establishment.”
Sanders, however, stopped short of declaring an actual victory, although he suggested his performance was evidence enough of a win, regardless of what the final count shows.
“Nine months ago, we came to this beautiful state,” the hoarse candidate said. “We had no money, no name recognition, and we were taking on the most powerful political establishment in the United States of America.”
“Tonight, while the results are still not known, it looks like we are in virtual tie,” he added, prompting raucous applause.
Meanwhile, Clinton, who most polls leading up to the caucuses showed had been in a statistical dead heat with Sanders, suggested that the race’s closeness was “good for democracy” and suggested a Sanders nomination could spell doom for the party.
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“There is so much at stake in this election,” she said at a Des Moines rally, where New York Mayor de Blasio was present. “It is rare that we have the opportunity we do now to have a real contest of ideas and to think hard about what the Democratic party stands for, and what we want the future of our country to look like.”
Former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, meanwhile, officially ended his presidential bid midway through vote-counting Monday night.
O’Malley, who had been polling in the low-single digits ahead of the Iowa contest, got the support of less than 1% of caucus-goers, prompting his early withdrawal.
He had received 7.68 delegate equivalents as of early Tuesday, with an additional 0.46 delegates awarded to “uncommitted.”
Ahead of the opening of caucus locations, Clinton and Sanders had campaigned furiously, with the surging Vermont senator signaling cautious optimism amid reports of high voter turnout.
“If there’s a large turnout, I think we’re going to do very well. If not, we’re going to be struggling,” Sanders told CBS News following a rally in Des Moines Monday morning.
“I think we’ve got a good shot to win,” added Sanders, who has capitalized on the support of young and progressive voters with a message focused on narrowing income inequality.
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Meanwhile, Clinton, who began the race nearly a year ago as the far-and-away front-runner in Iowa, said her campaign was fighting hard for a victory.
“We knocked on 125,000 doors this past weekend,” the former secretary of state said on NBC’s “TODAY” show Monday. “Although it’s a tight race, a lot of the people who are committed to caucusing for me will be there and standing up for me and I will do the same for them in the campaign and in the presidency.’
As voters flocked to caucus locations throughout the state, reports emerged that turnout was so high in some precincts that officials ran out of voter registration forms — a promising sign for Sanders, who relied heavily on the participation of first-time caucus-goers.
Same-day voter registration is legal in the state, meaning supporters can simply register before they caucus.
Caucus-goers appeared split as they headed to libraries, coffee shops and even their neighbors’ houses to carry out their election-year duty.
Chris Shaffer, a 55-year-old Des Moines resident, said he would support Clinton.
“I think Obama has done great and she needs to continue that. I like what Bernie says but I don’t know if he can do what he wants to do,” he said.
But in a sign of a possible generational split in the Democratic party, his daughter, Catherine Shaffer, said she would caucus for Sanders.
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“Bernie knows what he’s doing and I … can tell he’s a good person,” she said.
Polls in recent weeks had shown an increasingly tight race in Iowa, with the last such survey before Monday’s caucuses suggesting a statistical tie.
A Quinnipiac University poll released Monday afternoon showed Sanders beating Clinton 49% to 46%, within the survey’s 3.2-percentage-point margin-of-error.
The most recent poll released prior to that, a Des Moines Register / Bloomberg Politics poll with a track record of accurately predicting the caucus winner, showed Sanders trailing Clinton by only three percentage points, 45% to 42%, also within the poll’s margin-of-error.
With News Wire Services
