South Dakota and Montana, which hold primaries on Tuesday, are the last
Democratic nominating contests. Obama is favored in both states and he goes into
them with 2,069 delegates, 47 away from the number now needed to secure the
nomination. Clinton has 1,915.5 delegates.
Obama has made up most of the ground he lost Saturday when the national
party's rules committee agreed to reinstate delegates from Michigan and Florida.
The party had initially refused to seat the delegates as punishment for
scheduling their contests in violation of party rules.
With 31 delegates at stake Tuesday, Obama could close the gap further and
cue undecided superdelegates to come to his side.
But Clinton argues she now leads in the popular vote — a debatable point
given that she relies on Michigan and Florida outcomes. None of the candidates
campaigned in either state and Obama received no votes in Michigan because he
removed his name from the ballot. Clinton also continues to present herself
as better able to confront McCain in the fall.
She and her campaign's national chairman, Terry McAuliffe, both made it
clear Sunday night that Obama's supporters were now fair to pluck with those
arguments.
To drive the point home, Clinton invited Virgin Islands superdelegate Kevin
Rodriguez, a recent convert, to travel with her to South Dakota where she
planned to campaign Monday. Rodriguez had initially supported Clinton, switched
to Obama, and recently returned to her camp.
"This has been such an intense process," she said, "I don't think there has
been a lot of time for reflection. It's only now that we're finishing these
contests that people are going to actually reflect on who is our stronger
candidate."
Her decision, if prolonged, is not likely to sit well with party leaders and
some of her own supporters. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate
Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., have both called on the contest to end
shortly after the final primaries.
Tom Vilsack, the former Iowa governor and a national co-chairman of
Clinton's campaign, said Sunday: "It does appear to be pretty clear that Senator
Obama is going to be the nominee. After Tuesday's contests, she needs to
acknowledge that he's going to be the nominee and quickly get behind him."
Eager to make amends for avoiding Michigan's primary and build general
election support, Obama on Monday planned to hold a town hall meeting on the
economy in Troy, Mich.
Clinton, meanwhile, said she was still contemplating whether to challenge
the decision by the Democratic Party's rules committee to split the Michigan
delegates 69-59 in her favor. Each delegate would have a half vote. The
agreement granted Obama 55 uncommitted Michigan delegates and four who would have
been assigned to Clinton based on the state's results.
McAuliffe Sunday night called the panel's judgment "outrageous."
"People are angry," he said. "This does not unify our party, this crazy,
cockamamie thing they came up with in Michigan."
Here in South Dakota, Clinton pressed on against the odds.
In a campaign trail reunion usually reserved for election nights, she was to
join former President Bill Clinton and their daughter, Chelsea, at her last
Monday event in Sioux Falls, S.D.
Associated Press Writer Beth Fouhy in Washington D.C. contributed to this
story.
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