U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders needs to pull off a monumental victory against his rival Hillary Clinton on Tuesday in six states across the country if he hopes to win the Democratic Party's presidential nomination—and to do that, he'll need that victory to persuade the so-called superdelegates who are now overwhelmingly on Clinton's side.
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California, New Jersey, Montana, New Mexico, and North and South Dakota are all voting on June 7, while the U.S. territory Puerto Rico votes on Sunday.
However, California, the most populous state in the union, is the real prize, with an unmatched 546 Democratic delegates up for grabs. During a campaign rally on Friday, Sanders said he was looking forward to the California race, which he declared the “most important and significant primary off this whole nominating process."
Leading up to Tuesday’s vote, 44 percent of California Democrats said they would support Sanders and 43 percent said they would back Clinton, according to a new poll from the Los Angeles Times.
“If there’s a large voter turnout, we will win. If there is a very large voter turnout, we will win with a big margin," Sanders stated.
Clinton currently leads Sanders by 269 pledged delegates, so Sanders needs to take 68 percent of the pledged delegates left to erase Clinton’s lead.
But even that would not be enough to win the nomination. In addition to California, Sanders also needs to win the superdelegates — party elites who can back whichever candidate they like, regardless of the popular.
To date, Clinton has garnered 1,716 delegates while Sanders has 1,433. However, when superdelegates are included, Clinton is ahead with 2,240 versus Sanders' 1,473.
However, superdelegates are allowed to change their mind before the July 25-28 Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.
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If Sanders pulls off a victory in California, his campaign advisors and political strategists have stated that they will seek to “persuade superdelegates that it is in their own self-interest and the best interests of their party that Democrats nominate the candidate best able to defeat Donald Trump," according to a statement on Sanders' website.
Sanders is more likely to defeat Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump in the November general elections than Clinton, according to recent polls.
Earlier this month, nonpartisan polling organization RealClearPolitics showed that Sanders had a 13 percent advantage over Trump, while Clinton's lead was about 5 percent.