County to pick caucus delegates Saturday

PHARR - The Hidalgo County Democratic Convention on Saturday will be nothing like the chaos that ensued on primary night earlier this month, party officials said Wednesday.

Local precinct delegates plan to gather Saturday at the McAllen Convention Center, 700 Convention Center Blvd., to decide exactly how many of the county's 113 delegates will head to Austin on June 6-7 to vote for Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama.

About 1,344 precinct delegates are slated to participate in the county convention. Those delegates were selected at precinct caucuses on March 4.

"There won't be the problems we had at the precincts," said Juan Maldonado, the outgoing Hidalgo County Democratic Party chairman who lost his re-election bid earlier this month. "We'll be more precise and thorough."

Watchers from the Texas Democratic Party will be on hand to make sure the process is conducted in accordance with prescribed procedure, said Rosalie Weisfeld, a state party representative.

Of the 1,344 precinct delegates selected at caucuses in the county, about 85 percent went for Clinton, with the balance going for Obama.

However, Clinton's victory doesn't mean that same 85 percent proportion of delegates will head to Austin to vote for her. The exact allocation of the county's 113 delegate votes between the two candidates will be decided through another round of caucusing at the Democratic county convention.

At the state convention, the party will decide how Texas's 67 caucus-chosen delegates - which represent nearly one-third of the state's overall total of 228 delegates - will vote at the Democratic National Convention in Denver in August.

For the county convention, doors to the McAllen Convention Center are set to open at 9 a.m. Saturday, according to Maldonado. The process of allocating delegates will start about 10:30 a.m. and likely will last about four hours, he said.
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Kyle Arnold covers business, the economy and general assignments for The Monitor. You can reach him at (956) 683-4410.