Boring, yet important information.

The Democratic “Texas Two Step”
The Texas Democratic Party’s rules to award delegates is causing some controversy. That’s because even if one candidate wins the primary, they may not get the most delegates if the other candidate’s supporters know to stick around for the caucus. The Clinton campaign has threatened to sue the party because it fears that exact situation may happen. Some would say Sen. Barack Obama has a better organized grassroots effort in Texas, which means his camp may be able to inform more voters on the importance of sticking around for the caucus or precinct convention.

“We sent a letter to both campaigns, saying the process is what it is. We don’t get to the change the rules in the middle of the game,” said Texas Democratic Party Chairman Boyd Richie.

Democratic Delegate Breakdown
Texas has 228 democratic delegates.
126 of those delegates are divided proportionally among the candidates according to the primary votes.
67 delegates are chosen at the caucus or precinct convention.
35 are super delegates (made up of elected officials, the party chair, etc) who can make their own choice.

At the caucus, neighbors will gather and choose delegates to go on the county convention. Let’s say they get to choose two delegates. If there are an even number of Obama and Clinton supporters at the caucus, one delegate will be chosen for Obama and the other for Clinton. If the great majority of people who go to the convention are Obama supporters, however, he will get both delegates.

The delegates chosen in every one of the 3000 precincts across the state will then go their individual county conventions. At the county convention, they can offer themselves up to continue as a delegate and if they are selected, they go on to the state convention. There, 67 delegates will be chosen from that pool to go on to the national convention and vote for the candidate they were chosen to represent at the caucus on the night of the primary.

“This two step process was formed to force people to get involved at the grassroots level,” said Richie.

In this case, the grassroots could end up picking the Democratic nominee.

The Republican Precinct Convention
The Republicans also have a precinct convention after the primary at their polling locations. However, this has no impact on your vote. This is the place to go, however, if you want to represent who the voters chose on the ballot and go on to the county convention, state convention and national convention.

Republican Delegate Breakdown
Texas sends 140 delegates to the Republican National Convention.
96 are chosen according to the vote in each of the state’s 32 congressional districts. If one candidate gets more than 50% of the vote in a district, they will get all three delegates for that district. If no one gets the majority, the delegates are divided proportionally among the candidates who got more than 20% of the vote.
41 of the delegates are called at-large and are awarded also either as a winner takes all (if the candidate gets more than 50% of the Republican votes overall in the state) or they are divided proportionally if no one gets a majority (again, they must get at least 20% of the vote to get delegates).
3 are uncommitted delegates and can vote as they please. They are position holding members of the party.