Much for Mrs. Clinton depends on shoring up her support in the portions of the electorate–including women, low- and middle-income voters and Hispanics–that have provided her with victories in key states. In Texas, Mr. Penn [Mrs. Clinton’s senior campaign adviser] said Mrs. Clinton would be helped by the Latino vote — which he said could ultimately be as much as 40 percent of the electorate. But Mrs. Clinton faces another problem there in the form of that state’s unusual delegation allocation rules. Delegates are allocated to state senatorial districts based on Democratic voter turnout in the last election. Bruce Buchanan, a professor of political science at the University of Texas at Austin, noted that in the last election, turnout was low in predominantly Hispanic districts and unusually high in urban African-American districts. That means more delegates will be available in districts that, based on the results so far, could be expected to go heavily for Mr. Obama. Mrs. Clinton, Dr. Buchanan said, “has got her work cut out for her.”
The New York Times
Obama’s Lead in Delegates Shifts Focus of Campaign
(Feb. 14)
