Kerry v. Clinton: Nevada Caucus Skirmish

Heavyweights Bill Clinton and John Kerry acted as infighting surrogates on a last minute lawsuit by plaintiffs with alleged connections to the Hillary Clinton campaign intended to prevent some service workers from caucusing at select Nevada casinos.

Former President Clinton argued that the casino caucuses were deliberately set up to have a disproportionate impact on the outcome of the contest. Clinton said, "Do you really believe that all the Democrats understood that they had agreed to give everybody who voted in a casino a vote worth five times as much as people who voted in their own precinct? Did you know that?"

Clinton is referring to a decision last March by the Nevada Democratic Party to have special at-large caucus sites to allow those service workers to participate in the caucus. The Culinary Workers Union, who represents those workers was involved in pushing for the sites.

Meanwhile former presidential candidate and current Barack Obama supporter, John Kerry, accused those who brought the lawsuit of attempting to disenfranchise voters. Said Kerry, "Mere days before the caucus, we now see a lawsuit to shut down those at-large sites and deny the casino workers their right to vote. Three of the plaintiffs voted for the very plan they’re now trying to block – reasonable people have guessed they’re changing their minds presumably because just a few days ago the Culinary Workers Union endorsed Barack Obama."

For their part, both Obama and Hillary Clinton are distancing themselves. Hillary Clinton said she is aware of the lawsuit, but hopes it "can be resolved by the courts and the state party because, obviously, we want as many people as possible to be able to participate. ... In the meantime, I'm just going to campaign as hard as I can here in Nevada."

Obama, at a Culinary Union event Sunday, said the rules were fine until the union decided "'I'm going to support the outsider, I'm going to support the guy who's standing with the working people instead of the big shots.'"

"You don't win an election and you don't serve democracy by trying to keep people out," Obama said. "You're supposed to try to bring them in and encourage everybody to get involved."

Quotes from the AP, the NY Sun, and TPM Cafe