Associated Press Responds To Criticism Over Declaring Hillary Clinton Dem Nominee Before Final Primaries

After the Sanders campaign criticized the Associated Press for determining Hillary Clinton to have accrued the requisite number of delegates to clinch the Democratic nomination for president, Senior Vice President and Executive Editor Kathleen Carroll issued this statement.

AP concluded that Hillary Clinton had enough delegates to clinch the nomination after a painstaking but very straightforward exercise.

We counted.

By Monday evening, 571 superdelegates had told us unequivocally that they intend to vote for Clinton at the convention. Adding that number to the delegates awarded to Clinton in primary and caucus voting to date gave her the number needed to be the presumptive nominee.

That is news, and reporting the news is what we do.

Nothing in that discourages or prevents voters in six states from exercising their right to go to the polls today and cast their ballots.

It should be noted that John Kerry was declared the Democratic nominee on March 10, 2004, based on AP superdelegate tally.

Primaries/caucuses after that date: KS, IL, AK, CO, PA, IN, NE, WV, AR, KY, OR, AL, SD, MT, and NJ.