This year, they really are Virginia's superdelegates

Illinois Sen. Barack Obama may have won an overwhelming victory in Virginia's presidential primary last week, but gaining the state's 16 Democratic superdelegates, whose votes could help determine the party nominee, may not be as easy a task.

In fact, more Virginia superdelegates have committed to New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton than to Obama.

At least six have said they will back Clinton's presidential bid. Four, including Gov. Timothy M. Kaine and three congressmen, say they will support Obama at the Democratic National Convention this summer in Denver.

Even with lobbying from both campaigns, at least four of the state's superdelegates have not yet committed to either candidate.

Some of the superdelegates said in recent interviews that they have been overwhelmed by the unusual fervor surrounding a political role that has long been inconsequential to both the primary races and the general public. The close race between Clinton and Obama, however, has led some experts to say that the nomination will likely come down to how the superdelegates vote at the national convention.

"We've never been in this position before," said Del. Jennifer L. McClellan, D-Richmond, a superdelgate who has pledged her support to Clinton. "We've never mattered before."

Some of Virginia's superdelegates say they are being lobbied by constituents or campaign workers to vote a certain way.

The attention has created especially difficult situations for politicians who support a candidate who was not favored by a majority of their contituents.

Del. Lionell Spruill Sr. of Chesapeake endorsed Clinton then watched as Obama carried many of the legislator's South Norfolk precincts by large margins. Spruill still stands behind Clinton, but has said he will re-evaluate his support after the March 4 primaries in Texas and Ohio.

U.S. Rep. Rick Boucher said this week he will back Obama, even though Clinton carried his region - the 9th Congressional District in southwest Virginia - by a 2-to-1 margin.

"I am convinced he is our most compelling candidate," Boucher said. Superdelegates, he said, should "make analytical and seasoned decisions about who would be the strongest nominee. They are not supposed to make emotional choices."

The country's 795 superdelegates make up nearly 20 percent of the 4,049 delegates who will vote at the national convention in August. It will take 2,025 delegate votes for either Clinton or Obama to secure the Democratic nomination.

Obama currently has 1,351 delegates and Clinton has 1,262, according to The Associated Press.

With Obama's Feb. 12 win in Virginia, he picked up 54 pledged delegates awarded to him based on the state's primary results, according to the Democratic Party of Virginia. Clinton picked up 29 delegates.

The superdelegates have a vote at the convention but are not bound to primary results. Party leaders came up with the superdelegate system in 1982 as a way to give elected officials more control over the nomination. The group includes Democratic National Committee members and Democratic members of Congress and governors.

In Virginia, the superdelegates include Kaine and U.S. Reps. Bobby Scott, Jim Moran and Boucher. They also include past and present party officials, labor leaders, grass-roots activists and campaign consultants.

At the heart of the debate is how superdelegates should vote: Should the party member support the candidates endorsed by a majority of state voters? Or is a superdelegate free to vote for any candidate?

Those who plan to support Clinton say the Virginia primary shouldn't determine their positions.

"I'm elected to exercise my best judgment for the party, and that's what I'll do," said superdelegate Mame Reiley, a Clinton backer who heads the Democratic National Committee's Women's Caucus. "If we were to simply mirror what the state or region does, there's no reason for us to exist."

Some superdelegates have no intention of breaking early promises.

"I gave my word to Hillary Clinton," said Susan Swecker, a Democratic National Committee member who was also a former state director for Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry's 2004 presidential bid. "I grew up in a rural area where your word is gold. I'm going to keep my word while this process plays out."

Other Virginia superdelegates have ties to Clinton. Terry McAuliffe, a former party chairman, is now her campaign chairman. Barbara Easterling, the secretary-treasurer for the Communications Workers of America, worked with Clinton on health care issues when Bill Clinton was in the White House.

However, Alexis Herman, secretary of labor during the Clinton administration, has not taken a position in this year's primary, a representative said.

Others who have yet to commit are U.S. Sen. Jim Webb, Virginia AFL-CIO President Jim Leaman, state party chairman C. Richard Cranwell, and Jerome Wiley Segovia, the director of a Latino voter recruitment project. 

Joe Johnson, a political consultant who has previously advised the Rev. Jesse Jackson and former Virginia Gov. Mark Warner, did not return a phone call or e-mail.

Cranwell says too much is being made of the superdelegates, because the nominee will pull ahead before the primaries are over.

"I think the fray will be settled long before the convention starts," said Cranwell, who served in the Virginia House of Delegates from 1972 to 2001.

McClellan hopes Cranwell is right.

She has received e-mails from some of her constituents trying to sway her away from Clinton and toward the candidate her district chose, Obama.

The difficult part from now until the August convention will be balancing "between what we think and what the people we represent tell us they want," McClellan said.

Still, she said, "I hope it's resolved before we get there."

This report contains information from The Washington Post.

Mike Saewitz, (757) 222-5207, mike.saewitz@pilotonline.com