Of the 227 Texas delegates to the Democratic National Convention, 126 were allocated based on the district-level primary vote. Another 42 at-large delegates were selected at the state convention in proportion to their candidates' success in the caucus process. In addition, 56 party leaders and elected officials (25 pledged and 31 unpledged) got to go. There were an additional 3 unpledged add-ons selected at the convention.
I found this chart of the diversity goals for the Texas delegation.
Out of 202 district-level, at-large, and unpledged delegates selected, the goal was to select at least 72 Hispanics, 54 African Americans, 9 Asian Pacific Islander Americans, and 1 Native American. The goals for ethnic diversity add up to 136. But, the convention exceeded these goals, selecting 78 Hispanics, 75 African Americans, 11 Asian Pacific Islander Americans, and 5 Native Americans. That adds up to 169, leaving 33 Caucasian delegates - 16 of which were party leaders and elected officials and got to go anyway!
So, of the 168 national delegates selected at the state convention, only 17 were Caucasian? Can this be right? Am I missing overlap of the ethnic classification? (The Statement of Candidacy form says to select only one ethnic group.) And this when almost 50 percent of the Texas population is 'White non-Hispanic'?
Now, how about male versus female.
According to recent Pew Research polls, nationally, 60 percent of men identify themselves as Republican or Republican-leaning. And McCain leads Obama 55-35 percent with Caucasian males. (By the way, of the people who identify themselves as Democrats, 23 percent are Black and 11 percent are Hispanic.)
I did a quick scan of the delegate list from the Texas Democratic Party. If you look at the 168 delegates chosen at the convention (disregarding the party leaders and elected officials), it comes out to be 94 women and 71 men (with one not listed). Maybe that's representative of the gender split in the Texas Democratic Party.
Of the district level delegates, the count was 66 women and 57 men. You would expect this to be close since we were instructed to select an equal number of men and women in each of the 62 caucuses (two - one each for Obama and Clinton - for each of the 31 senatorial districts). The different totals result from caucuses electing an odd number of delegates. (The count was 50-50 when there were an even number of delegates to be chosen, and 16 women versus 7 men, when an odd number of delegates was selected.)
Finally, of the 42 at-large delegates - the convention's Nominations At Large committee's tool for effecting ethnic, gender, and other diversity goals - they picked 27 women and 15 men.
So, of the delegates selected at the convention, there were 93 women and 72 men. I guess this somewhat compensates for the fact that the people in charge are mostly men. It turns out that the only group that has more men than women is the PLEO (party leaders and elected officials), where men lead women 41-18.
Does this mean that the Texas Democratic Party needs to reach out to Caucasian males to add some diversity to the organization? Or maybe this is just Fun With Numbers and it doesn't really matter who goes to the national convention!
NOTE: This post was written three weeks ago - before the Democratic convention (where the Texas delegation didn't actually get to vote).
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