WASHINGTON — With the nomination in sight, Barack Obama is willing to give Hillary Rodham Clinton the lion’s share of the delegates from Florida and Michigan but is stopping short of her demand to fully recognize the two renegade states.
The Democratic National Committee is trying to work out a compromise to the long-running dispute over Michigan and Florida.
In violation of party rules, the two states held primaries in January and were stripped of their delegates. The DNC’s Rules and Bylaws panel meets Saturday.
The DNC could decide to send half the delegates to the convention, but what’s uncertain is which half. Another option is to seat all the delegates with half a vote. Then the issue is how those votes should be split between Clinton and Obama.
Whatever decision is made during a party meeting Saturday delays a resolution of the Democratic contest, just as Obama is within reach of the 2,026 delegates needed to win the nomination.
“Our magic number could increase kind of at the eleventh hour here,” Obama campaign manager David Plouffe said Wednesday. He told reporters: “If it’s raised a little bit based on the Rules Committee, we’ll have to go get some more superdelegates. But at some point we’re the nominee.”
Clinton has been pushing for the Democratic National Committee to seat all 368 delegates from Florida and Michigan. She won both contests — after all the candidates agreed not to campaign in either state and Obama wasn’t on the Michigan ballot.
Clinton strategist Harold Ickes is one of the 30 members of the committee, and he said he’ll be encouraging them to base their decisions on the January primaries.
That’s an unlikely outcome as even Clinton aides have privately acknowledged they lack the votes on the committee to restore all the delegates. Thirteen members are publicly committed to Clinton, and eight have endorsed Obama.
