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Bernie Sanders declares victory in Iowa amid caucus confusion

Posted at 3:02 PM, Feb 06, 2020
and last updated 2020-02-06 15:28:42-05

The Iowa caucuses Monday nights are still a hot topic of conversation, as three days later we still don't have official results.

However, that isn't stopping the candidates from declaring victory. A few candidates used their internal results to tout their campaign's performance Monday night.

But today with 97% of the results tallied, Senator Bernie Sanders felt confident enough to declare victory during a speech in New Hampshire, the next primary state.

Sanders says he won the popular vote in Iowa by about 6,000 votes and that "with eight strong candidates competing, that is a decisive margin of victory."

Earlier in the day, DNC Chairman Tom Perez called for an immediate recanvass of the caucus results.

Results from Monday's caucuses were delayed due to a coding issue with an app that party officials were hoping would streamline the reporting process.

According to Iowa Democratic Party Chair Troy Price, after the coding error was discovered, the party went into its back-up plan of counting ballots manually, which has taken longer than expected.

Although not all results have been reported by the IDP, both Sanders and former South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg have claimed victory.

The latest results show the two separated by 0.1%.

The difference at the moment is about three state delegate equivalents. Iowa in turn gets 41 national delegates, but it's also important to remember that there are nearly 4,000 delegates up for grabs nationwide.

The next state to vote is New Hampshire, whose primary is on Tuesday, Feb. 11.