Clinton camp: Lift Fla., Mich. sanctions

The states’ Democrats were stripped of their delegates for violating party rules.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Harold Ickes, a top adviser to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s campaign who voted for Democratic Party rules that stripped Michigan and Florida of their delegates, now is arguing against the very penalty he helped pass.

In a conference call Saturday, the longtime Democratic Party member contended the DNC should reconsider its tough sanctions on the two states, which held early contests in violation of party rules. He said millions of voters in Michigan and Florida would be otherwise disenfranchised — before acknowledging moments later that he had favored the sanctions.

Ickes explained that his different position essentially is due to the different hats he wears as both a DNC member and a Clinton adviser in charge of delegate counting. Clinton won the primary vote in Michigan and Florida, and now she wants those votes to count.

“There’s been no change,” Ickes said. “I was not acting as an agent of Mrs. Clinton. We had promulgated rules and those rules said the timing provision ... provides for certain sanctions, automatic sanctions as a matter of fact, if a state such as Michigan or Florida violates those timing provisions.”

“With respect to the stripping, I voted as a member of the Democratic National Committee. Those were our rules and I felt I had an obligation to enforce them,” he said.

Ickes’ dual positions on the issue illustrate some of the internal division within the party as Clinton and Obama run neck and neck in the Democratic presidential race.

Some Democratic leaders have expressed concern that the tight contest might ultimately hinge on the positions of some 700 party insiders known as superdelegates.

Civil rights leaders also have been somewhat split on whether seating the Florida and Michigan delegates would unfairly disenfranchise minority voters.

As of Saturday, the delegate count stood at 1,280 for Obama and 1,218 for Clinton. If the DNC were to award Michigan and Florida’s 313 delegates based on the vote in their primaries, she would be ahead because she won both states.

On Saturday, Ickes reiterated the campaign’s view that new “redo” votes in Florida and Michigan aren’t necessary.

In response, the Obama campaign said Ickes’ viewpoint runs counter to democratic principles.