WASHINGTON (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris has secured enough delegates to become the Democratic presidential nominee, according to Democratic National Committee Chair Jaime Harrison, but it's not time for the balloon drop just yet.
Harrison made the announcement Friday as part of a livestreamed video organized by the Harris campaign, although neither the DNC nor the Harris campaign provided a comprehensive vote tally.
Delegates to the Democratic National Convention began officially selecting their nominee for president in a process that kicked off Thursday. But unlike in past years, they are not doing so in the raucous party atmosphere of the convention floor or even during the convention itself. Instead, they are participating in what the party calls a "virtual roll call" and filling out electronic ballots at their homes, offices and vacation spots more than two weeks before the first delegate steps foot inside Chicago's United Center.
Harris was the only candidate eligible to receive votes after no other candidate qualified by a Tuesday night deadline. She's looking to officially claim the nomination on Monday evening when the DNC is expected to release final results.
How does the virtual process work?
Nearly 4,700 delegates are using an electronic voting method the party says is similar to one used to tally virtual roll call votes in the 2020 convention, when the COVID-19 pandemic forced the party to conduct much of its official business remotely.
Under new procedures adopted by the convention's rules committee in late July, candidates had until Tuesday to declare their intent to seek the nomination and until that night to submit the 300 delegate signatures required to qualify for the roll call vote. According to a DNC statement, Harris submitted signatures from 3,923 delegates, about 84% of the full delegation and 99% of delegates who signed a petition.
Any vote cast for someone other than Harris in the roll call will be counted as "present."
Voting will remain open until Monday at 6 p.m. ET, and Harrison urged delegates who had not voted yet to do so by the deadline.
Who gets to vote?
Among those voting are pledged delegates selected through state primary and caucus processes as well as more than 700 others who have automatic delegate slots by virtue of the elected office or party positions they hold. These include Democratic governors, U.S. senators and representatives, former presidents and DNC members.
These automatic delegates, known informally as superdelegates, were the subject of much debate within the party for years because of their potential to influence the outcome of a close nomination fight despite not having been selected for their posts through a public process. Historically, however, superdelegates have never backed a candidate for the nomination other than the one who also earned the majority of pledged delegates.
After the 2016 election, the party passed changes that allowed superdelegates to vote only on the second and subsequent ballots. Party rules do allow superdelegates to vote on the first ballot if a candidate has either won a majority of pledged delegates through the primary and caucus process, like Biden did, or submitted the signatures of a majority of total delegates, as Harris did.
What will the results look like?
The DNC said in a statement on Friday that it would announce final, state-by-state results after voting concludes on Monday. That's a departure from how presidential roll calls are usually conducted by either party. In past conventions, the roll call votes were tallied in real time before a national audience, with state delegations announcing their votes from the convention floor or, in the case of the 2020 Democratic convention, through remote video presentations from every state and territory.
Friday's livestreamed event from the Harris campaign provided an occasional update on what is said was the overall vote tally before Harrison's announcement but not a real-time breakdown by state or an indication of how many votes were cast for "present." The DNC has not provided any vote updates since Harrison's announcement.
What about the nominee for vice president?
Once Harris officially wins the nomination, the new convention rules allow her to place the name of her pick for vice president into nomination, at which point the convention chair can declare that candidate as the vice presidential nominee.
Harris said Tuesday she had not yet decided on her No. 2. But she, and whomever she selects, will head out on a seven-state swing of key battlegrounds, including Pennsylvania, Arizona and North Carolina, next week.
Why is this happening before the convention?
DNC officials first indicated in May that they would conduct a virtual roll call to clear a potential hurdle in getting the Democratic nominee on the ballot in Ohio. Ohio's deadline to file for the general election ballot is Aug. 7, two weeks before Democratic delegates would have crowned the nominee at the convention.
Although the deadline had been modified in previous presidential election years to accommodate late-summer conventions of both parties, this year state Republicans initially planned to enforce the existing deadline, with one GOP lawmaker calling the scheduling bind " a Democratic problem."
The Republican-controlled Legislature did eventually make the change at the behest of Republican Gov. Mike DeWine, but the law does not go into effect until Aug. 31. Citing concerns that Ohio Republicans could still try to block their candidate from getting on the ballot despite the legislative fix, DNC officials decided to move forward with their virtual roll call as originally planned.
What about the speeches and balloons?
Although the official balloting and vote-counting are taking place remotely and mostly behind closed doors, aside from one delegate's announcement of her vote during the Harris campaign's livestreamed event, the DNC says the convention will feature a ceremonial roll call vote, mimicking the traditional ritual of state delegations announcing their votes from the convention floor with much fanfare.