My Caucus Experience in Texas

NEWSFLASH: Obama won (more delegates in) Texas!! WHOOT WHOOT!!!

The major news stations are failing to report the final delegate numbers slowly rolling in from the caucuses on last Tuesday. I'll say I was very upset that he lost the primary, and by such a large margin. Sorry for the crappy pictures, but it was dark, cold and crowded.

I wanted to share and document my first (and probably last) caucus experience. In case you didn't know, Texas has a crazy Two-Step Primary System, whereby a portion of our state's delegates are awarded based on a primary vote and the remaining 1/3 are awarded based on the results of a caucus, held on the night the polls close.


The polls officially closed at 7PM, so I arrived at my local polling place around 6 to watch the last of the voters rush the polls. Somehow, at the last minute, the voting locations were consolidated and 5 different precincts were all voting & caucusing at the same location. The parking quickly got out of control, but that was the least of the problems. I met up with a rapdily growing group of Obama supporters, standing at least 100' from the actual voting area. We chatted with voters, answered questions and encouraged people to stick around for the caucus.


A little after 7, the group of Obama and Clinton supporters were instructed by a mysterious source to move forward near the empty space between the gym building and the main school building. About 7:15 I could still see a line with about 70+ people snaking out the voting door. These voters had arrived, parked and made it to the primary voting line before 7.



Both groups of caucus supporters had to wait outside, in the 40 degree weather until all the voting had concluded. We waited, and waited and waited some more! We were herded around a few times since all the supporters were technically violating the law by being too close to the voting area. It was great to see so many people standing and waiting patiently, committed to our crazy democratic process.


The precinct judge eventually came outside the voting area to attempt to divide the 5 precincts into separate groups in order to prepare for the caucus. My precinct ended up having about 80 people, and I would guess there were 300-400 people there total with the other precincts.



It was 8:45 before the last voters exited the primary voting area, and they poll workers could then begin organizing for the caucus. We were the first precinct to go into the gym, and I think the other 4 groups went into the school itself. We started out by dividing our group into a Clinton area and and an Obama area. A sign-in sheet of paper was distributed to each group and we all signed in and listed our candidate of choice. I was actually surprised how quickly the caucus itself went, it was just the wait for the voters that was awful.


Our precinct had about 2:1 Obama to Hillary supporters, so hopefully we were able to send a few delegates to the state (or district) convention to represent Obama! All in all, I've read some super crazy reports from the larger voting areas- the caucus not starting till after midnight or people getting into heated altercations. Everybody was fairly friendly, although I did run into a few nutty people. It was a fabulous experience & I'm so happy I was able to be a part of such a great moment in history. (Even if I did give up Faith Hill Rodeo tickets for the night!).

Sorry about the wonky pics- it was dark, crowded and I was doing the "hold the camera over my head and shoot" method.

GOOD NEWS OF THE DAY: Obama won Mississippi yesterday too!!