ST. PAUL, MINN. — The first announcement came just after dawn Tuesday: A Michigan superdelegate had pledged her support to Barack Obama.
Within hours, a dozen more superdelegates followed suit. Then another dozen. By late afternoon, Obama was just eight delegates short of the 2,118 needed to capture the Democratic nomination for president.
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Thursday, June 05, 2008 Home Edition Main News Part A Page 2 National Desk 2 inches; 77 words Type of Material: Correction
Obama superdelegates: An article in Wednesday's Section A about superdelegates backing Sen. Barack Obama for president reported that Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles) did not praise Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton when Waters announced she was switching her support to Obama. Waters, in a statement, actually called Clinton an extraordinary candidate, saying, "As an outspoken advocate on issues critical to women and children, I have great admiration for Sen. Clinton and know firsthand her commitment to our country."
After months of resisting pressure to take sides, superdelegates from Missouri, New York, Ohio and elsewhere across the nation fell into line behind Obama on Tuesday in a choreographed effort to settle his epic battle against Hillary Rodham Clinton.
The groundswell was enough to crown the Illinois senator as the party's White House nominee, and the question of how Democrats would make history -- by nominating the first woman or the first African American from a major party for president -- was answered.
"One campaign season is ending tonight, and another is beginning," Obama strategist David Axelrod told reporters on the way to the candidate's celebration here.
It was a painstaking effort to turn the slow, day-by-day drift of superdelegates toward Obama into a final daylong surge that settled the race just as voters cast the last ballots of the nominating season in South Dakota and Montana.
As late as Tuesday morning, Obama was making phone calls to court superdelegates, the party and elected officials whose support he needed to break the stalemate.
Many of them "respected both candidates and didn't want to make their decisions before the end of this process, and we've been talking to them all along," Axelrod said.
"We've gone back to them in the last few days and talked to them about whether they were ready now, and many of them were," he said.
Still, the staging was evident, most of all when Obama's campaign announced a burst of more than two dozen new superdelegates just minutes before he walked on stage here in an arena packed with 17,000 cheering supporters.
Many who turned Obama's way were members of Congress. Among them was Rep. Maxine Waters of Los Angeles, who announced she was switching from Clinton with not a word of praise for the New York senator and former first lady.
On Capitol Hill, Rep. Jan Schakowsky of Illinois led Obama's effort to round up support from House Democrats. Pressure on superdelegates mounted last week, she said, when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada began asking the uncommitted to take sides soon after Tuesday's primaries.
