O'Malley Potential Iowa Caucus 2016 Spoiler

DES MOINES,IA – Democrat Hillary Clinton scolded rival Bernie Sanders’ campaign Sunday — after Sanders’ campaign scolded hers — for using almost afterthought candidate Martin O’Malley to manipulate the weird math Democrats use to determine a winner in Monday’s first-in-the-nation Iowa caucuses.

O’Malley, a former governor of Maryland, barely shows up in an influential Des Moines Register/Bloomberg Politics Iowa Poll released two days before Iowans cast the first votes in the U.S. presidential nominating process. But Sanders’ campaign thinks he can be a spoiler in Iowa, which isn’t a winner-takes-all-delegates state.

Some of Sanders supporters are encouraging caucus-goers to support O’Malley so he will be “viable” and steal delegates from Clinton and leave her short, creating an opening for Sanders to win most of Iowa’s delegates, Vocativ reported.

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Clinton held a 3 percent lead over Sanders, 45 percent to 42 percent, for the Democratic nomination, while O’Malley trails at 3 percent, according to the Iowa Poll, one of the most respected in the nation.

To understand the strategy, you have to understand how the Democrats’ complex, sometimes hours-long process works: Democrats gather at approximately 2,000 precinct locations across the state and hear pitches from candidates’ surrogates, then cluster into preference groups.

Clinton’s campaign promoted the same strategy. Sanders’ campaign told BuzzFeed it’s “sad and telling that (Clinton’s) campaign doesn’t think they can win without these kinds of tactics.”

Vocativ analytics did a deep web dive, and discovered a guide to caucusing for O’Malley on the r/SandersForPresident subreddit thread.

Here’s an example of how the spoiler strategy could work: If Clinton earns 50 percent of the votes in a precinct with three delegates, backing for O’Malley with 16.66 percent of the votes would take one away from her.

For his part, O’Malley told KCCI-TV in Des Moines Monday that he’s encouraged his supporters to hold strong and fight for viability.

Liz Garst, a prominent Coon Rapids Democrat, told Bloomberg View the caucus process favors Democrat Hillary Clinton. Garst is an O’Malley supporter, but doesn’t expect him achieve the viability threshold. If that’s the case, Garst said she would reluctantly join the Clinton group.

» Photo by Gage Skidmore via Flickr / Creative Commons