Motivation as the Kingmaker?

Prior to Edwards dropping out of the race political pundits and people from the Edwards campaign have referred his role in this election as either the spoiler or kingmaker. The media has portrayed the Democratic primary race as a two candidate race, with Obama and Clinton as the front runners. Edwards has battled with having less media attention as well as less funding during the campaign. As the odd man out, who was not a strong enough contender to actually win the nomination, it seemed that he was still motivated to stay in the race if he could play the role of kingmaker. If Edwards was able to gain 300-400 delegates throughout the primary, and neither Clinton or Obama had the majority by the end of the June, he would decide which candidate he could swing his delegates to, ultimately deciding who will take the nomination. Edwards would most likely give his delegates to the candidate who was most similar in their stances on issues, or would fight for some of Edwards ideals. Although, the goal was to win the nomination, playing the role of kingmaker motivated Edwards to continue his campaign with the hope of having his issues heard and supported by another Democratic candidate.

Unfortunately, Edwards not only had little hope to win the nomination but after a very poor showing in some of the early primaries, in New Hampshire, coming in third in his home state of South Carolina, and Nevada, he had only gained 26 delegates. After not doing as well as expected in some of the early primaries, it was becoming clear that he would not earn enough delegates to play the role of kingmaker and his continued presence may leave him with the role of a spoiler. Although Edwards campaign had planned on staying in the election through Super Tuesday on February 5th, he dropped out at the end of January. He spoke with both Clinton and Obama about continuing to fight income inequality and while he did not get to play the role of kingmaker, on the day he announced he was leaving the race both Obama and Clinton announced they would continue Edwards fight to combat poverty. Even without being the kingmaker, Edwards has had some important impacts on domestic policy for the entire Democratic party.

Courtney Bellmer