Ten Hours as a Democratic Delegate
Mar 3rd, 2008 by nick
“I don’t belong to any organized party. I’m a Democrat,”
- Will Rogers
After attending the El Paso County Democratic Convention the weekend before last, I was feeling a bit like Will Rogers. After arriving promptly at 8 AM I stood in line outside waiting to register for two hours. And this wasn’t Southern California temperature – it had snowed the night before. It seems that the county conventions are not usually this popular, so the organizers weren’t ready for the number of people who showed up. Luckily the local Obama supporters were handing out free bagels, of which I partook with only the smallest amount of guilt as a Clinton delegate.
When I was finally allowed inside, I registered and dutifully submitted my vote for Clinton in the “preference poll.” After finding a seat in the balcony, I proceeded to wait some more. Finally, although the organizers were still seating delegates, the politicians started speaking.
We first heard from the Obama representative. The excitement and momentum for Obama was almost overwhelming. The person speaking on his behalf got a standing ovation before he started speaking, and the crowd, at least 75% Obama delegates, was clearly energized.
Although the Clinton delegates tried admirably to match the Obama crowd, it was obvious that the same excitement just wasn’t there. The person speaking on behalf of Clinton was harder to hear and less dynamic than the Obama supporter.
Interestingly, the demographics matched what I’d been reading about in the news: Most of the African-Americans present seemed to be Obama supporters, while almost all of the Hispanics appeared to be Clinton supporters.
Following the candidate speeches, we heard from several local and state politicians. Some highlights:
- Mark Udall, who is running for an open United States Senate seat from Colorado, and is currently serving in the House of Representatives, said, “The most important vote I cast in the house was a vote against the war in Iraq.”
- Mike Merrifield, a state representative from Colorado Springs, said, “Republicans [in El Paso County] are so egotistical that, when lightening strikes, they turn around to see if God was taking their picture.”
- Hal Bidlack, who is running for the United States House of Representatives seat currently held by Doug Lamborn, said, “You are an American, even if you’re not in the top 2% of the economy.”
In general, there was palpable excitement about the turnout, about our candidates for President, and about the potential for Democrats in El Paso County to have a banner election year. As the minority party in the county, the line of the day was, “I didn’t know there were this many Democrats in El Paso County!”
After the politicians finished speaking, we sat around for another two hours or so, until the official proceedings finally got underway. The assembly and convention (I’m not quite sure of the difference) both basically consisted of electing volunteers to various committees, such as the “Permanent Organization Committee” and the “Credentials Committee.” We also elected delegation chairs and secretaries. Most of these elections were not contested, or had only two candidates for a spot, so we were able to vote with a voice vote. Unfortunately, a few of the positions, such as the “Resolutions/Platform Committee” were more competitive. These votes were kind of a mess. Instead of electronic voting, or something more efficient, we just raised our hands and waited while the sergeants-at-arms counted votes. As there were about 2000 delegates, and about 16 people vying for an 8-member committee, this process took a while. To make matters worse, it wasn’t clear for a while who was counting in the balcony, so we had to start over at one point!
Finally, around 5 pm, this process finished. At that point, one of the officials announced the preference poll results of 1072 votes for Obama and 471 for Clinton, which translated to 272 delegates to the state convention for Obama and 119 delegates for Clinton. Then we separated into the Obama camp and the Clinton camp to elect delegates to the state convention.
As a Clinton delegate, I of course attended the Clinton session. This session was the most disorganized part of the day. We spent the whole time standing in a hallway, and it wasn’t clear even who was in charge! One person suggested we move to the “mini-auditorium,” another person suggested we go to a different room, and someone else grabbed the microphone and started directing the proceedings right there in the hallway. There appeared to be no plan for choosing the state delegates. One person suggested that everyone who wanted to be a delegate go to one side of the hallway. That was quickly nixed in favor of a random selection. We didn’t seem to have any official ballot boxes, so we all put our names in some random cardboard boxes that were passed around. In the meantime, some people were becoming quite agitated, yelling at each other, and mostly acting disgusted with the whole disorganization.
Because I was told I’d receive something in the mail if I was chosen to be a delegate, I didn’t stick around to find out if my name was pulled. When I left at 6 PM they were still looking for a room in which to perform the selection. I haven’t heard anything yet about being a delegate, but I may still get something in the mail.
All in all, the day was mostly boring and disorganized. However, it was exciting to spend some time around other excited Democrats, and participating in the process was certainly educational. Truth be told, it’s democracy itself that’s messy, not just the Democratic party.
Thanks for the summary so that the rest of us can live vicariously.
The question for any blogger is: Does anyone read this stuff? Well Nick I am. As for the County Convention seemingly a year ago your observations were correct. Ironically I now know some 21 HPCUU’ers were there as well. You were lucky, I spent from 7 AM to 11:30 AM facilitating the registration of 1560 + delegates and alternates. The registration could have gone much smoother but the County Democratic is poor and those leading the party have little management expertise. In fact, for the local Clintonite’s (supporters) and Clintonista’s (burning activists) the party leadership and those who organized the caucuses and convention were mostly Clinton people. This is why you haven’t been notified with your lottery based delegate selection process in that today I called and found out that it would another week for the volunteers to slog through their old fashioned efforts and determine who are delegates and alternates to the CD-5 Assembly and State Convention. One gripe is that they are adverse to receiving volunteer help or suggestions how to make the process go smoother, but that if for January’s leadership period.