[W]ith one week until the last big round of presidential nominating contests, Bernie Sanders is paying nearly all his attention to one state: California.
Five other states will also vote June 7, including New Jersey, Montana and New Mexico. But while Sanders recently ducked down to the state called the Land of Enchantment to visit the Mexico border and seek votes, virtually every recent rally has been on California land.
Sanders has been hustling up and down the Golden State over the past weeks, from the northern college town of Davis to the southern oceanfront city of San Diego.
Facing an expensive media market while having only $6 million in the bank, Sanders is aiming to get his message out chiefly through rallies. He has set a goal of speaking before more than 200,000 Californians by the time the state votes next week.
California is the biggest prize on the primary calendar, with 475 pledged delegates to be allocated based on the primary results. A win in America’s most populous and diverse state would add to his political capital as he enters the Democratic National Convention in July.
“We’re going to go in (to the convention) with momentum, and we’re going to come out with the Democratic nomination,” Sanders said Sunday in Bakersfield.
While Sanders continues to proclaim that his goal remains clinching the nomination, his priorities are shifting now that he has been all but eliminated in the competition for delegates. Last week, Sanders was given significant influence over the writing of the official party platform, a win for his campaign. He is now pushing to reform the party’s nominating system by eliminating superdelegates and allowing independents to vote in every state’s Democratic nominating contest.
“It is absurd, because independents do vote in the general election,” Sanders said in a recent interview with Rolling Stone. “What you’re saying is, ‘You can’t vote now, and we don’t want you to come into our party. But you can vote later on.’ I think that’s dumb.”
In addition, Sanders is publicly calling on Hillary Clinton to pick a progressive as her running-mate.
A California win for Sanders is certainly possible. After months of polls showing Clinton ahead, data released last week from the Public Policy Institute of California gave her just a slight edge over Sanders, 46 percent to 44 percent.
A poll released Tuesday from the Hoover Institution had harsher numbers for Sanders, with Clinton holding a 13-point lead over the Vermont senator, 51 percent to 38 percent.
The discrepancy in the two polls can be largely explained through demographics. The Hoover poll had Sanders leading 2-to-1 among millennials, who are hard to get to the voting booth. Sanders also recorded a 40-point lead over Clinton with independent voters.
If Sanders can get these groups out to vote, he has a chance of victory, though California’s primary system further complicates the picture.
The Sanders campaign says it has has registered more than 1.4 million new voters in California since January.
But the state has a modified open primary system, wherein officially registered independents may not vote. Voters who have registered as Democrats or are officially unaffiliated may vote in the primary.
Additionally, many of the California colleges where Sanders is seeking support will either be in the middle of exams or out for the summer on primary day.
In an effort to raise awareness of Sanders and strengthen support among eligible voters, the campaign decided last week to spend $1.5 million on television time. The move came after high-level staffers clashed over whether ads for California were worth the money.
California’s political history boasts a number of progressive achievements that align closely with Sanders’ platform. The state recently enacted a $15 minimum wage, and free tuition in the University of California system was enacted in 1868 and lasted through much of the 20th century.
However, Gov. Jerry Brown, who is widely known for his progressive politics, endorsed Clinton in a letter Tuesday.
“This is no time for Democrats to keep fighting each other,” wrote Brown. “The general election has already begun. Hillary Clinton, with her long experience, especially as Secretary of State, has a firm grasp of the issues and will be prepared to lead our country on day one.”
Sanders has roughly 40 staffers in California and is pouring nearly all of his resources into the state. But even if he wins big there, he won’t secure enough pledged delegates to overtake Clinton, who leads by more than 200.
The other five states voting June 7 have a total of 260 delegates up for grabs. Sanders has at least two staffers working in each of those states, and he is favored to win Montana, South and North Dakota, and New Mexico.
But Clinton appears poised to win New Jersey, a state with 142 delegates that could basically secure her title as the party’s nominee once superdelegates are taken into account. Sanders has basically ignored New Jersey in campaigning, but roughly 10 Sanders staffers are working there.
