2016 Democratic Party presidential primaries

Presidential primaries and caucuses were organized by the Democratic Party to select the 4,051 delegates to the 2016 Democratic National Convention held July 25–28 and determine the nominee for President in the 2016 United States presidential election. The elections took place within all fifty U.S. states, the District of Columbia, five U.S. territories, and Democrats Abroad and occurred between February 1 and June 14, 2016. Between 2008 and 2020, this was the only Democratic Party primary in which the nominee had never been nor had ever become President of the United States. This was the first time the Democratic primary had nominated a woman for president.

Six major candidates entered the race starting April 12, 2015, when former Secretary of State and New York Senator Hillary Clinton formally announced her second bid for the presidency. She was followed by Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, former Governor of Maryland Martin O'Malley, former Governor of Rhode Island Lincoln Chafee, former Virginia Senator Jim Webb and Harvard Law Professor Lawrence Lessig. A draft movement was started to encourage Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren to seek the presidency. Warren declined to run, as did incumbent Vice President Joe Biden. Webb, Chafee, and Lessig withdrew prior to the February 1, 2016, Iowa caucuses.^[2][3]

Clinton won Iowa by the closest margin in the history of the state's Democratic caucus to date. O'Malley suspended^[b] his campaign after a distant third-place finish, leaving Clinton and Sanders as the only two candidates. The race turned out to be more competitive than expected, with Sanders decisively winning New Hampshire, while Clinton subsequently won Nevada and won a landslide victory in South Carolina. Clinton then secured numerous important wins in each of the nine most populous states including California, New York, Florida, and Texas, while Sanders scored various victories in between. He then laid off a majority of staff after the New York primary and Clinton's multi-state sweep on April 26.^[5] On June 6, the Associated Press and NBC News stated that Clinton had become the presumptive nominee after reaching the required number of delegates, including both pledged and unpledged delegates (superdelegates), to secure the nomination. In doing so, she became the first woman to ever be the presumptive nominee of any major political party in the United States.^[6] On June 7, Clinton secured a majority of pledged delegates after winning in the California and New Jersey primaries.^[7] President Barack Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and Senator Elizabeth Warren endorsed Clinton on June 9.^[8][9] Sanders confirmed on June 24 that he would vote for Clinton over Donald Trump in the general election^[10] and endorsed Clinton on July 12 in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.^[11]

On July 22, WikiLeaks published the Democratic National Committee email leak, in which DNC operatives seemed to deride Bernie Sanders' campaign^[12] and discuss ways to advance Clinton's nomination,^[13] leading to the resignation of DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz and other implicated officials. The leak was allegedly part of an operation by the Russian government to undermine Hillary Clinton.^[14][15] Although the ensuing controversy initially focused on emails that dated from relatively late in the primary, when Clinton was already close to securing the nomination,^[13] the emails cast doubt on the DNC's neutrality and, according to Sanders operatives and multiple media commentators, showed that the DNC had favored Clinton since early on.^{[16][17][18][19][20]} This was evidenced by alleged bias in the scheduling and conduct of the debates,^[c] as well as controversial DNC–Clinton agreements regarding financial arrangements and control over policy and hiring decisions.^[d] Other media commentators have disputed the significance of the emails, arguing that the DNC's internal preference for Clinton was not historically unusual and did not affect the primary enough to sway the outcome, as Clinton received over 3 million more popular votes and 359 more pledged delegates than Sanders.^{[28][29][30][31][32]} The controversies ultimately led to the formation of a DNC "unity" commission to recommend reforms in the party's primary process.^[33][34]

On July 26, 2016, the Democratic National Convention officially nominated Clinton for president^[35] and a day later, Virginia Senator Tim Kaine for vice president.^[36] Clinton and Kaine went on to lose to the Republican ticket of Donald Trump and Mike Pence in the general election.

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