Enthusiasm for President Barack Obama's re-election at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina is running so high that five North Carolina delegates were no-shows for the vote to re-nominate Obama last night, while nineteen delegates from his home state of Illinois were no-shows. A spokesman for Illinois House Speaker Mike Madigan, who doubles as the state party chairman,
explains the missing 19 votes, which represented about 9% of the state's delegation:
It was just before midnight Friday when Illinois House Speaker and State Democratic Party Chairman Mike Madigan cast the state delegation's 196 votes to nominate a "son of Illinois," President Barack Obama, for re-election.
That happened to be 19 votes short of the 215 votes allotted to Illinois by the Democratic Party.
What gives? Somebody still holding out for Hillary?
A Madigan spokesman explained that under Democratic National Committee rules each state must submit a signed tally sheet with the names of each of its electors.
Illinois did not receive its tally sheet until 5 p.m. Tuesday and had to return it by noon Wednesday. Hence, nineteen people never got around to signing.
North Carolina's missing delegates included one who lived within a mile of the site of the convention. Chairman David Parker brushed off the missing votes as mere "logistical mishaps" which did not reflect on the level of enthusiasm for Obama:
North Carolina cast 152 votes for Obama, despite having been awarded 157 delegates to the convention.
North Carolina Democratic Party Chairman David Parker brushed off the missing votes and said the five missing votes merely reflected logistical mishaps.
Parker said some of the delegates missed a breakfast and he "tried to run them down" throughout the day but could not track them down by the time North Carolina delegates had to cast their votes.
Rep. Larry Kissell (D-NC) is one North Carolina Democrat who has stayed away from the DNC even though his district is less than a mile from where the convention is taking place because being associated with Obama hurts his reelection chances. According to the Charlotte-Observer, Republican staffers offered to drive Kissell to the convention this week. In addition, Democrats could not fill Bank of America Stadium for Obama's reelect, and moved Obama's speech on Thursday back indoors to a smaller venue to avoid embarrassment.
And yet, Parker, the Democratic party chair in North Carolina, continued to downplay the fact that Democrats in North Carolina who were distancing themselves from Obama and the DNC reflected a lack of enthusiasm in North Carolina for Obama's reelection.
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