Tulsi Gabbard Wins a Delegate. The DNC Might Still Keep Her Off the Debate Stage.
The anti-war candidate's scoring of a delegate in American Samoa might earn her a spot on in the next Democratic debate.
Rep. Tulsi Gabbard's (D–Hawaii) presidential campaign hasn't made a lot of headlines lately. Until today! The Hawaiian representative has just won her first delegate.
Gabbard scored 103 of the 351 votes cast in the American Samoa caucus. At just shy of 30 percent of the vote, that is enough to win her one of the island territory's six delegates.
That wasn't enough for Gabbard to win the caucus outright. Former Mayor Michael Bloomberg won 49.9 percent of the vote, giving him four delegates.
It's still a victory for Gabbard's long-shot presidential bid that's so far failed to expand outside an eclectic base of voters who have responded to the candidate's laser-like focus on opposing intervention abroad.
Winning a delegate has an added benefit for Gabbard. It might earn her a spot on the next Democratic debate.
If Tulsi Gabbard gets a delegate out of American Samoa, as it appears she has done, she will likely qualify for the next Democratic debate. We don't have new debate rules yet, but party has been inviting any candidate who gets a delegate.
— Dave Weigel (@daveweigel) March 4, 2020
Already, staffers for the Democratic National Committee are throwing cold water on that idea, saying the threshold for future debates will be raised.
We have two more debates-- of course the threshold will go up. By the time we have the March debate, almost 2,000 delegates will be allocated. The threshold will reflect where we are in the race, as it always has.
— Xochitl Hinojosa (@XochitlHinojosa) March 4, 2020
It would be a shame to keep Gabbard off the stage. Despite her failure to gain traction with voters, Gabbard's presence at the debates has allowed her to inject an anti-war message into conversations that have focused almost entirely on domestic issues.
If allowed onstage, she could even reprise her role as debate stage assassin, issuing devastating takedowns of other candidates. (It happened to Kamala Harris. It could happen to you, Michael Bloomberg.)
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“…Despite her failure to gain traction with voters, Gabbard’s presence at the debates has allowed her to inject an anti-war message into conversations that have focused almost entirely on domestic issues.”
Looks like Trump might have stolen a march on her.
That’s my girl. You go get ‘em.
(Listens to Mary Tyler Moore show theme song)
Bloomberg
boughtwon Samoa.He needs beefy gardeners.
Promised each of them a bucket of KFC.
FIRE TORPEDOS
SINK USS GABBARD
SHE’S GONE… rouge.
She’s wrong on so many things, but she’s the only one in the clown car who isn’t an absolute scumbag on a personal level.
The DNC of course, will never forgive her for gutting Willie Brown’s whore, but she did them a huge favor by taking that narc down.
-jcr
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Missing a bunch of precincts and all of CA, but it seems Bloomies ad blitz once again shows buying elections is tough.
Biden seems to be the fave among ‘moderate Ds’; they’re hoping he can beat Trump and deliver an inaugural address without sniffing the hair of some woman standing next to him.
Considering that Bloomberg has done almost nothing but spend money, I actually think he’s done pretty well. I hear a lot of pundits scoffing at his ads because they’re such outrageous lies about all the wonderful things he’s done, but for most people who have no idea who he is, his ads are all they know about him. And as long as he keeps a personal low profile that’s all they’ll ever know. If he can get a significant chunk of delegates – as he appears to be doing – he’s going to muscle Warren out of third place and in a brokered convention third place is going to be a sweet spot to be sitting in.
Well, until you remember it’s third place in a race to get your ass handed to you by Trump.
“…I hear a lot of pundits scoffing at his ads because they’re such outrageous lies about all the wonderful things he’s done, but for most people who have no idea who he is, his ads are all they know about him…”
Perhaps, but his most recent “I’m the only one who can save America!” is far enough over the top to make even TDS victims wince.
He and Steyer started out as nothing other than claimants to the throne of ‘beating Trump!’
Problem is, once (and if) you’ve done that, now what?
Both went full evangelical: Steyer was going to ‘save the planet!’ (until it got too expensive), and Bloomie is going to ‘save America!’.
From what? A raging economy?
Regardless of his lies about keeping people out of jail, what’s he offering to people with jobs, lower taxes and the ability to use that back 40 now that the EPA has been told to fuck off?
Biden is kicking ass. Thank god.
ok, your username made me laugh
Biden couldn’t get his leg that high.
Bloomberg is pretty short.
Meanwhile, in the great state of North Carolina, No Preference leads the Libertarian Party primary at 27.98% of the votes with about 60% of precincts reporting.
If allowed onstage, she could even reprise her role as debate stage assassin, issuing devastating takedowns of other candidates. (It happened to Kamala Harris. It could happen to you, Michael Bloomberg.)
This is exactly the reason the DNC would prefer to keep her off the stage. That and the fact they fucking love endless conflict as much as the GOP does.
Nailed it.
Gabbard is clearly the most feared candidate as measured by the inattention the media goes out of its way to enforce. This concept of viability is anti democratic and exposes those who invent reasons to deny the public from hearing certain voices as frauds. The issues and perspective Tulsi Gabbard brings to fore are authentically representative of the vast majority of working class people in the USA.
A veteran urging us to scale back our commitments abroad is, indeed, beyond the pale for the pro-war establishment. Imagine if she were president and could actually end those wars.
Exactly. That all needs to be memory holed so the graft can continue.
The complete backstabbing by the DNC against Tulsi shows you just how much the Democrats want to continue the war machine. She checked ALL the ID politics boxes and was treated like a leper, when the only difference between her and the field was that she constantly talked about the futility of endless war.
You forget – she committed the unforgivable sin of telling the truth about another candidate.
“It could happen to you, Michael Bloomberg.”
It already did happen to Bloomberg, he is finished, his SuperTuesday strategy has failed. He will likely get 2nd place in Utah, and maybe Colorado, and its too early to tell in California. But Biden had such a big day in the South and Minnesota and Massachusetts that Bloomberg had to win at least one decent sized, preferably purple state to have any viability going forward.
Bernie looks like he’s going to have a big win in California, they already called it for him with just 5% of the vote counted.
Maybe he just runs endless ads about how Trump is bad? The Democrats can certainly use Bloomberg’s money, if not Bloomberg himself.
And we can all enjoy Bloomie blowing his wad on his TDS.
But once he’s bounced out of the race, I’m betting his checkbook goes back in his pocket; it was ego-driven.
Here’s NPR’s latest:
https://apps.npr.org/liveblogs/20200303-super-tuesday/
According to what I’ve read, Bloomie was focused on CA to the exclusion of other states, and he certainly spent money here. E-ads, the Superbowl, time on college hoops, etc; most high-buck buys.
He might come in 2nd (but his numbers have been falling), certainly not ‘cost-effective’.
And Sanders gets the CA nod?
Oh
My
Goodness!
CA hereby gives Trump a second term.
“focused on CA to the exclusion of other states”
That’s just flatly untrue. Bloomberg almost certainly outspent everyone in every state. He’s been on the air 24/7 for over a month in Florida, with a couple of weeks still to go – nobody else is even running ads yet. When you are over a half a billion in spend and nobody else is even close to that number, it would be hard to have ignored the other states. He’s already spent more than the Trump campaign did in winning the general election, and he’s closing in on Hilldog’s number. That kind of money means you didn’t skip anywhere.
Yeah, been seeing Bloomberg ads for months here in AZ.
every commercial break in Texas. fail.
Multiple back-to-back advertisements in IL.
I never watch TV or listen to Radio here, so I have no idea if Bloomberg spent money in my state.
I never watch TV or listen to Radio here, so I have no idea if Bloomberg spent money in my state.
Do you tell everyone that you’re uninformed and self-absorbed or just strangers on the internet?
The DNC and RNC are both private organizations. That means they can pretty much do what they want to do.
Yes, and they can lose too. The UniParty needs to be swept out of DC. They are both corrupt to the core.
I wish Tulsi Gabbard would realize she’s far more Libertarian than a Progressive retard.
C’mon guys, if Tulsi looked like Janet Reno and not eye candy, she’d be laughed at – if not outright ignored – by 99% of us here. But maybe the eye candy aspect is why the Dems ignore her?
We know she’s ignored because of her anti-war stance. I’m sure going against Queen Hillary last election didn’t help, either.
Yep- she’s attractive. Stossel obviously has a crush on her – but that hasn’t helped her in the primaries so far. Gabbard has no chance at even getting close to the nomination, so it’s no surprise the DNC might not let her participate in the next debate. Having said that – she would likely ask some good questions – and maybe even make Liz Warren look more foolish than either Biden or Sanders would. I know that’ s mean – but Liz is an annoying scold – and I would enjoy seeing her smacked down.
C’mon guys, if Tulsi looked like Janet Reno and not eye candy, she’d be laughed at – if not outright ignored – by 99% of us here.
Yup. The only reason anybody in libertarian circles paid any attention to or even outright defended Kim Davis is because she was so attractive. If Amash, Massie, or Paul looked more like hobbits than the chiseled Adonises they project we probably wouldn’t pay any attention to them either.
She’s attractive. It may help. A little. Acting like her attractiveness is the only reason people (don’t) pay attention to her is an insult to her and us and is an overt display of your lack of awareness and intelligence.
Tulsi is not that physically attractive.
She’s *personally* attractive as the only Democratic candidate who actually does seem to like America and Americans.
Women who look like Janet Reno don’t get elected to the White House.
Democrats and progressives tend to be full of ugly women, so yeah, they hate her.
She lost Samoa to Bloomberg. Did Bloomberg campaign there? Is that all he got for 500 million dollars? A future in Samoan politics.
Losing at home is complete and utter failure. Elizabeth Warren losing Massachusetts and no reservation for Pocahonky to fall back upon. Nut case Kasich lost Ohio. Al Gore still sore over dangling chads but lost his home state of Tennesee.
When the people that know you best say no, you don’t have a political future.
well duh how’s H going to make money off missiles if Tulsi shuts down the wars?
It’s still a victory for Gabbard’s long-shot presidential bid that’s so far failed to expand outside an eclectic base of voters who have responded to the candidate’s laser-like focus on opposing intervention abroad.
Anybody at Reason remember what the topic was that Tulsi spilled Kamala Harris’ entrails over on the debate stage? Anyone? Here’s a hint: it wasn’t foreign intervention. Anyone? Need another hint: It’s a pretty solidly libertarian stance on a solidly libertarian issue? Anyone?
A vote for Biden is a vote for his running mate.
Tulsi has exactly one more delegate than I have. There is no objective reason for her to be included in the debate.
I don’t know why the DNC even bothers with primaries. It is very clear that just like in 2016, they are trying to fix the race. There is nothing democratic about the DNC. The electorate needs to be shown who the “chosen” one is. Bernie fans will boycott the DNC in November if they rig it against Bernie.
If the DNC didn’t want to be accused of playing Calvinball, they should have changed the debate eligibility rules before the primary.