Barack Obama fired a warning shot over the heads of lawmakers who get to cast crucial votes at the party’s convention as uncommitted “superdelegates” – saying they shouldn’t override the will of the voters in their states.
Obama said superdelegates “would have to think long and hard about how they approach the nomination when the people they claim to represent have said, ‘Obama’s our guy.’ ”
The message: If you’re an elected member of Congress, and your district backs Obama, casting a vote for Hillary Rodham Clinton could be bad for your political career.
Obama delivered the message at a Chicago press conference yesterday – after he battled Clinton to a draw in yesterday’s Super Tuesday primaries and caucuses, carrying 13 states and barely besting her in the count of pledged delegates.
But when superdelegates who have pledged support for Clinton are counted, she gets the lead.
Pledged delegates have to reflect the will of voters in their states, but superdelegates – who include members of Congress, governors, and various party functionaries – get to vote for whomever they want.
Obama also said there was “a whole dump truck” full of dirt that Republicans could use on Clinton if she becomes the nominee – countering her repeated claim that she has been fully “vetted” whereas he hasn’t.
He said Clinton’s research operation was “about as good as anybody’s,” and it hasn’t found much dirt on him.
“I assure you that having engaged in a contest against them for the last year, that they’ve pulled out all the stops. And you know I think what is absolutely true is, whoever the Democratic nominee is, the Republicans will go after them,” he said.
“The notion that somehow Senator Clinton is going to be immune from attack or there’s not a whole dump truck they can’t back up in a match between her and John McCain is just not true,” he said.
Clinton, in her own press conference yesterday, said “this is a vigorous two-person contest now,” and called on Obama to agree to more debates.
“We’re going to be able to showcase our records, our qualifications, the differences, the contrast between us, because voters are really tuning in now,” she said.
“If voters start to think about who would be the best president, to be commander-in-chief on Day One, to turn the economy around and who would be the best Democratic nominee to win in November, I am very comfortable with the answers to those questions,” she said.
Clinton said there’s nothing in her past she has to try to paper over – including the years she represented big corporate clients as a lawyer for the Rose Law Firm in Little Rock, Ark.
Clinton unfailingly touts her time working on behalf of children and providing legal aide, but doesn’t talk much about time serving on corporate boards or representing big companies.
geoff.earle
@nypost.com