Iowa Caucus Results Thread (pg 148 - full results)

[cinyc]

Time for Pete to lose his Iowa "victory" credence for the third time

https://twitter.com/adamkelsey/status/1225615439109197824

The Sanders have to file a request for a Recanvass by Noon Central tomorrow with the Iowa Democratic Party. We'll see if they do it?

Odds that EVERY error breaks one candidate's way: close to 0%.

There are more errors than the Sanders camp cites. Who knows how they'll break? Plus, that satellite caucus thing where the Iowa Democratic Party appears not to be following their Delegate Allocation Plan rules could give more SDEs to Buttigieg - if they ever decide to look at it.

[cinyc]

Pledged Delegates:
Buttigieg — 13
Sanders — 12
Warren — 8
Biden — 6
Klobuchar — 1
Unallocated — 1

The unallocated DNC delegate will go to the winner of the SDEs. So yes, it matters.

Though they extended the deadline for the campaigns to report errors against the precinct tally sheets and call for a recount/recanvass, the  Iowa Democratic Party doesn’t seem to want to fix their mistakes or the math.

[cinyc]

I can make sense of the out-of-state satellite caucuses. There are two errors.

Total attendance was 1186. IDP rules provided 2 state delegates for between 1-500, and one additional for every additional 500 participants. The OOSS caucuses will thus have 4 state delegates. The actual delegates will be chosen by party preference among those persons who expressed a willingness to attend the state convention (there will be no virtual county convention). This would produce one each for Klobuchar, Warren, Buttigieg, and Biden (Sanders finished fifth).

The 4.000 SDE's are divided at the satellite caucus level. For example, the largest satellite caucus in Queen Creek, AZ had 162 participants. Queen Creek is southeast of Phoenix and Mesa on the Maricopa-Pinal county line. That caucus received 162/1186 x 4 SDE or 0.5464 SDE. This is logical, but is not obvious from the rules in the delegate selection plan.

Because the number of participants was greater than 100 the caucus received 9 county delegate positions. These were allocated in the usual fashion after viability determinations and realignment.

Initial: Klobuchar 53, Buttigieg 39, Biden 30, Warren 25, Sanders 7, Bloomberg 2, Steyer 2, Other 1, Uncommitted 3. It in unknown whether the Other voter wore a MAGA hat.

Viability was 15% or 24.3 rounds to 25. Four candidates were viable. Warren was just barely viable, but could have been made viable based on transfers.

2nd Alignment: Klobuchar 54 (+1), Buttigieg 41 (+2), Biden 33 (+3), Warren 31 (+6), uncommitted 3 (0). It is unknown whether the uncommitted were the same three persons throughout. In some caucuses in mainland Iowa, it appears that voters from nonviable groups who did not realign, were accounted for as uncommitted. In other caucuses, they just disappeared. It would appear that most Sanders supporters switched to Warren.

Delegate positions before rounding: Klobuchar 3.000, Buttigieg 2.278, Biden 1.833, Warren 1.722.

Delegate positions after rounding: Klobuchar 3, Buttigieg 2, Biden 2, Warren 2. Since this totals to 9, it is the final allocation. Had this been a conventional precinct, "county" delegates would have been elected.

The SDE's were then allocated. Remember that the satellite had been allocated 0.5464 state delegates as its proportional share of the 4 OOSS state delegates. This is then 0.0607 SDE per delegate. Klobuchar 0.1821, Buttigieg 0.1214, Biden 0.1214, Warren 0.1214.

The IDP shows Klobuchar 0.1820, Buttigieg 0.1213, Biden 0.1213, Warren 0.1213. I can not account for the discrepancy. I though it possible that there was one additional participant who did not participant in the initial alignment. But that does not appear to match the results. I would have to see the IDP spreadsheet to find the error, but it amounts to a tiny fraction of an SDE.

The largest error was in Washington, DC, which had exactly 100 participants. With 81-100 participants there should be 8 delegates. With 0.3373 SDE, that is 0.0422 SDE per delegate position. That matches the numbers on the IDP results. What does not match is the number of delegate positions. There were 9 delegate slots.

The SDE were calculated by the IDP. The delegate positions may have been calculated by the precinct leader in DC. The 9th delegate position was won by Warren. Warren should lose 0.042 SDE. This also brings the national delegates for the OOSS to 4 total.

The second error was in Fairfax, VA (George Mason). There were 15 participants, choosing 4 delegate positions. Therefore viability was 15 x 15% = 2.25, rounds up to 3.

The first alignment was Warren 8, Sanders 4, Klobuchar 2, Gabbard 1. The Gabbard supporter apparently realigned to Sanders. Klobuchar could have become viable if the Gabbard delegate had switched to her. Perhaps the caucus was aware of that possibility, and so the Klobuchar group did not realign.

The final alignment was Warren 8, Sanders 5, (Klobuchar 2). If the caucus leader thought that Klobuchar was viable, there would have been no reason to realign. If they failed to realign, they should not have been awarded delegates.

The final delegate allocation was Warren 2, Sanders 1, Klobuchar 1.

Had both Klobuchar delegates re-aligned to Warren, it would have been Warren 3, Sanders 1. Had one of the Klobuchar delegates re-algned to Warren, and the other switched to uncommitted it would have been Warren 3, Sanders 1. Had one or both Klobuchar delegates switched to Sanders it would have been Warren 2, Sanders 2. Had both delegates remained uncommitted it would have been Warren 2, Sanders 2.

The fairest solution might be to strip Klobuchar of the delegate, and assign it to uncommitted (indeterminate).

The following table shows the extra Warren delegate in Washington, DC; the erroneous Klobuchar delegate in Fairfax, VA; and does not show a Bllomberg delegate in Miramar Beach, FL or a Yang delegate in St. Paul, MN.

Caucus	Part.	SDE	Del.	Biden	Buttigieg	Klobuchar	Sanders	Warren
Queen Creek, AZ	162	0.5464	9	2	2	3	0	2
Port Charlotte, FL	135	0.4553	9	2	3	4	0	0
Palm Springs, CA	108	0.3642	9	3	2	4	0	0
St. Petersburg, FL	105	0.3541	9	1	2	4	0	2
Washington, DC	100	0.3373	8	2	2	0	1	4
Tucson, AZ	72	0.2428	7	2	1	2	1	1
Miramar Beach, FL	60	0.2024	6	2	1	2	0	0
New York, NY	56	0.1889	6	0	0	0	2	4
Cambridge, MA	51	0.1720	6	0	1	0	3	2
Green Valley, AZ	50	0.1686	6	1	2	3	0	0
Gulf Breeze, FL	42	0.1417	6	2	1	3	0	0
St. Paul, MN	32	0.1079	5	0	0	0	2	2
Stanford, CA	30	0.1012	5	0	0	1	2	2
Chicago, IL	24	0.0809	5	0	1	0	2	2
Chicago, IL	20	0.0675	4	0	0	1	2	1
Glasgow, GB	19	0.0641	4	0	1	0	2	1
Paris, FR	17	0.0573	4	0	0	1	1	2
Tucson, AZ	16	0.0540	4	2	2	0	0	0
Fairfax, VA	15	0.0506	4	0	0	1	1	2
Philadelphia, PA	14	0.0472	4	0	1	0	2	1
Brooklyn, NY	11	0.0371	4	0	0	0	3	1
Northfield, MN	11	0.0371	4	0	0	0	2	2
Providence, RI	10	0.0337	4	0	0	0	2	2
Ann Arbor, MI	9	0.0304	4	0	0	0	2	2
Milwaukee, WI	7	0.0236	4	0	0	1	1	2
Nashville, TN	7	0.0236	4	0	1	0	2	1
Tbilisi, GE	3	0.0101	4	0	0	0	4	0

The effect of the corrections in SDE.

Candidate	Correct	Original	Change
Biden	0.7068	0.7068	0.0000
Bloomberg	0.0337	0.0337	0.0000
Buttigieg	0.7709	0.7709	0.0000
Klobuchar	1.0531	1.0657	-0.0126
Sanders	0.5644	0.5644	0.0000
Warren	0.8368	0.8789	-0.0422
Yang	0.0216	0.0216	0.0000
Uncommitted	0.0126	0.0000	0.0126

So wait - the IDP didn’t skip the county delegate equivalent step when calculating the out-of-Iowa satellite caucuses, but did for the in-state satellite caucuses? And still somehow managed to screw up? Some of these screw ups appear to be on the official tally sheets. I think the IDP is taking the position that those can only be fixed at a recount requested by a candidate, if at all.

[cinyc]

The Iowa Democratic Party will hold a press conference at 3:30PM Central Time.

I’m sure this is going to go well.

[cinyc]

They removed their caucus information and data from their website:

https://iowademocrats.org/2020-caucuses/

Yikes.

[cinyc]

They removed their caucus information and data from their website:

https://iowademocrats.org/2020-caucuses/

Words fail.

Was going to make a 2016 vs 2020 turnout map (found 2016 attendence data!), but I guess I can't now, until they put it back up. NBC doesn't have the sattelite sites.

It’s still available at results.thecaucuses.org - at least for now.

[cinyc]

Listening now. Basically they are doing more "quality control" and checking the numbers again.

Yeah:

https://www.kcci.com/article/live-iowa-democratic-party-chairman-answers-questions-about-2020-iowa-caucuses/30814829

There wasn’t much new ground there. It also appears their position is that the precinct certifications are legal documents, and they’re not going to correct any math errors contained therein - at least before a recount (though it’s not clear if there can be changes even in a recount).

[cinyc]

So the lesson for the future is that precincts captains should refuse to sign the worksheets to prevent them from becoming legally binding? What kind of nonsense is that explanation?

No. They should make sure the worksheets are right. In the IDP’s view, this is really no different than a county certifying election results and sending them to the state board of elections to certify the election. The state often takes the certification at face value - even when the county precinct numbers ultimately don’t add up.

I can point to a number of races I’ve mapped where the precinct data didn’t make sense and didn’t match the numbers reported to the state.

[cinyc]

So the lesson for the future is that precincts captains should refuse to sign the worksheets to prevent them from becoming legally binding? What kind of nonsense is that explanation?

No. They should make sure the worksheets are right. In the IDP’s view, this is really no different than a county certifying election results and sending them to the state board of elections to certify the election. The state often takes the certification at face value - even when the county precinct numbers ultimately don’t add up.

I can point to a number of races I’ve mapped where the precinct data didn’t make sense and didn’t match the numbers reported to the state.

Yes but if there is a legal challenge then they go back and examine the records and see if anything is amiss. Just because something was written on a piece of paper doesn't make it legally binding forever and always.

It was unclear whether that explanation was only for their final count or any recount. But until a recount, it’s clear the IDP isn’t going to do anything about bad math in a certification.

[cinyc]

So...despite the NYT having Sanders has the favorite for SDEs with 97% in, now that 100% of the vote is in, Sanders lost the SDEs by 0.1% (2) delegates. Well, actually I saw 100% of the vote is one place, NYT says 97%, and the DMR says 99.9% (missing 1 precinct). lol They can't even agree on how much has been counted at this point.

President Trump has played this perfectly. He has talked about the issues, but didn't go over-the-top about it. Last time, he won 10% of Sanders supporters. If he can get more this time around it's all over.

NYT had Sanders at something like a 54% chance of winning with 97% in. A 54% favorite isn't much of a favorite. Something that can happen 46% of the time happens a little less often than tails in a coin flip.

[cinyc]

Des Moines Register article on the clustercluck that happened at the Iowa Democratic Party's war rooms on election night:

https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/elections/presidential/caucus/2020/02/08/iowa-caucus-2020-inside-democrats-chaotic-call-center-boiler-room/4690263002/

Some takeaways:

-They only had 50 people in the results call center, who didn't have training on using the failed app.
-A lot of people were calling these 50 people. One accused CNN of phonebanking them to try to get info.
-Even when the CNN phone bankers got through, the call center was compartmentalized from the rest of the organization. They ran results to another room that was using Google Sheets to input results and check the caucus math. They only had 15 people doing data entry.
-One person in the data center/strategy room basically said that although the errors are likely minor, there's no guarantee that the results "are 100% accurate, and they will never be." Yikes!
-Some moron or group of morons (4chan?) started calling in some fake results after precinct captains started posting pictures of precinct results on Twitter - complete with PIN numbers.

[cinyc]

What could go wrong?

https://twitter.com/meganmesserly/status/1226323087659941888?s=20

It's not an app! It's a tool!

Hopefully, they'll have more than 50 people in their phone bank in two weeks and won't publicize their hotline number so everyone under the sun can call them.

[cinyc]

https://twitter.com/tripgabriel/status/1226357866568863744

Yes that's absolutely fine

........................

THEN WHAT IS THE POINT OF ANY OF THIS

maybe he’s saying that they’ll correct the errors and update the results, but the original worksheets can’t be physically altered?

It sounds like all they're allowed to fix are any data entry errors transcribing the caucus worksheets into the IDP's reported #s.  But any bad math on the caucus worksheets themselves can't be fixed:

https://twitter.com/tripgabriel/status/1226360407423627264

Yup. And if the caucus worksheets are wrong, some candidate is going to have to ask for a recount, where they'll look at the candidate preference cards. But no campaign seems to have the appetite for one, so....

[cinyc]

https://twitter.com/tripgabriel/status/1226357866568863744

Yes that's absolutely fine

........................

THEN WHAT IS THE POINT OF ANY OF THIS

maybe he’s saying that they’ll correct the errors and update the results, but the original worksheets can’t be physically altered?

It sounds like all they're allowed to fix are any data entry errors transcribing the caucus worksheets into the IDP's reported #s.  But any bad math on the caucus worksheets themselves can't be fixed:

https://twitter.com/tripgabriel/status/1226360407423627264

Yup. And if the caucus worksheets are wrong, some candidate is going to have to ask for a recount, where they'll look at the candidate preference cards. But no campaign seems to have the appetite for one, so....

o i see so there’s a distinction between recanvass and recount

I'm not sure whether there is. The party is supposed to have a Recanvass and Recount Procedural manual, but I can't find it online. The IDP's Delegate Selection Plan allows candidates to either contest specific precincts for a recount or ask for a recanvass. But I'm not sure if a recanvass wouldn't do that, too.

Even the candidate who sells Math hats isn't interested in a recount or recanvass thus far. He'd be able to under the delegate plan, but would have to pay for it. Which, given the IDP's mess, is a bunch of crap.

[cinyc]

So wait - the IDP didn’t skip the county delegate equivalent step when calculating the out-of-Iowa satellite caucuses, but did for the in-state satellite caucuses? And still somehow managed to screw up? Some of these screw ups appear to be on the official tally sheets. I think the IDP is taking the position that those can only be fixed at a recount requested by a candidate, if at all.

I have not looked at the instate caucuses.

You should. It appears they skipped the whole county equivalent delegate step and just allocated delegates proportionally to turnout. Because of the cap at 100, that favored the larger sites more than they should have - which generally benefited Sanders.

It's not clear whether the IDP is going to be able to fix this math error without a campaign asking for a formal recount or recanvass or whatever.

[cinyc]

https://twitter.com/tripgabriel/status/1226357866568863744

Yes that's absolutely fine

........................

THEN WHAT IS THE POINT OF ANY OF THIS

maybe he’s saying that they’ll correct the errors and update the results, but the original worksheets can’t be physically altered?

It sounds like all they're allowed to fix are any data entry errors transcribing the caucus worksheets into the IDP's reported #s.  But any bad math on the caucus worksheets themselves can't be fixed:

https://twitter.com/tripgabriel/status/1226360407423627264

This is the dumbest thing I've ever heard. If judging math miscalculations is personal opinion then making the original calculation is personal opinion.

I guess the argument would be that if the three sets of numbers don't agree with each other (first alignment, final alignment, SDE), then it's not necessarily possible to figure out which one is wrong without guessing?  I haven't followed this closely enough to know if the errors are indeed fixable without making any assumptions, but that's my guess.

The IDP's argument is that the precinct certifications are legal documents agreed to by the candidates (their precinct captains sign it). If there's a math error contained therein, a candidate will have to ask for a recount. Then, they'll look at the pledge cards. Your explanation as to why is usually correct - we don't know which of the three sets of numbers is wrong without looking at the pledge cards.

Granted, if the error is something like giving out too many or too few delegates, your explanation becomes less likely true. But it's still a legal certification.

[cinyc]

Official delegate tally:

Buttigieg: 14
Sanders: 12
Warren: 8
Biden: 6
Klobuchar: 1

Finally over? Let's move on. NH is around the corner. Both Bernie and Buttigieg did really well.

Unless someone asks for a recount or recanvass by Noon tomorrow, it's over. No candidate seems to want to do that, unfortunately. Math matters.

[cinyc]

Networks refusing to call is smart

Wayyy too many errors.

Btw, it seems every error HURTS Bernie

Taniel’s list includes zero instances of Buttigieg being hurt

I doubt Taniel's list shows zero instances of Buttigieg being hurt. The odds of that happening are close to 0. Plus, we know Buttigieg was hurt by the in-state satellite caucus error - if it hasn't been corrected in this batch and the IDP's position is on it is wrong.

[cinyc]

Official delegate tally:

Buttigieg: 14
Sanders: 12
Warren: 8
Biden: 6
Klobuchar: 1

That is not the official delegate tally.

The delegates are only determined after the county convention and then the state convention. If history is any guide (candidates with greater enthusiasm over-perform in county conventions), Bernie Sanders will probably end up winning more delegates than Buttigieg after all that is over and done with, because his supporters are probably more likely to show up at the county conventions and then at the state conventions, whereas other candidates are relatively more likely to have no-shows.

So it is more likely to end up something like Bernie 14, Buttigieg 12.

Yes it is. They locked everything in at the later conventions this year. There will be no no-shows changing results.

[cinyc]

If Sanders’ team really hated SDEs, they should’ve advocated to eliminate them after 2016. Which, to be fair, I would support; why do SDEs exist anyway??? Just use the vote totals like every other contest!

SDEs exist because of the structure of the Iowa caucuses. Precinct caucuses elect delegates to county conventions, which elect delegates to district and state conventions. State Delegate Equivalents are the equivalent of delegates to the state convention. From what I understand, it's how the Democrats have always computed the Iowa winner - at least since 1976. But we've never seen the first and final alignment votes until this cycle. Ironically, greater transparency is causing this issue.

[cinyc]

If Sanders’ team really hated SDEs, they should’ve advocated to eliminate them after 2016. Which, to be fair, I would support; why do SDEs exist anyway??? Just use the vote totals like every other contest!

SDEs exist because of the structure of the Iowa caucuses. Precinct caucuses elect delegates to county conventions, which elect delegates to district and state conventions. State Delegate Equivalents are the equivalent of delegates to the state convention. From what I understand, it's how the Democrats have always computed the Iowa winner - at least since 1976. But we've never seen the first and final alignment votes until this cycle. Ironically, greater transparency is causing this issue.

I guess what I don’t understand is, why is the Iowa Democratic caucus so unique? The other Democratic and Republican caucuses, not even the GOP Iowa caucus, operates like this; they all just use vote totals.

It's the way it's always been done, I suppose.

[cinyc]

https://twitter.com/ryanobles/status/1226928467884859394

Does anyone have a timeline for the recanvass and anything else from Iowa?

The result needs to be certified by February 29, under the state’s delegate plan - though I suppose they could extend it, like they did for recounts. Other than that, it depends on what Iowa’s Recount and Recanvass Procedural Manual says. Last I checked, I couldn’t find it online.

[cinyc]

In yet another frustrating little wrinkle, why is Vox reporting different (and seemingly more up-to-date) vote totals than AP and the other news organizations??

Vox, and the New York Times, and others (I'm sure) are reporting post-correction numbers. Specifically, numbers corrected after the Iowa Democratic Party corrected duplicated precincts and the like. Why they are reporting missing precincts when their numbers match correctly against those saying every single precinct has been counted, I'm not sure.



Also, sad to see sore losers... Sanders and Buttigieg... asking for a recanvass.

They're not sore losers for asking for a recanvass. In an ideal world, all the candidates would be asking for a recanvass and recount of the whole thing because getting the results right is more important than getting this over with fast.

[cinyc]

Can someone please provide me the results of the final alignment by CD? Can't find a map anywhere.

Since the results aren't final, the map isn't final, but here:

https://twitter.com/SenhorRaposa/status/1225878512919306241