Since a few of you have asked for it…here are the first standings! I did not think there would be much scoring this early, but I was definitely wrong. I will do these posts sporadically (or I will try to give quick updates in the Facebook group).
Eric: 485
Julius: 420
Matt: 400
Scott: 390
Jason K: 345
Josh: 340
Ryan: 335
Melissa: 335
Rich: 285
Adam W: 230
Jason I: 230
Denise: 220
Justin: 220
Sean’s Ramblings: 220
Bill: 215
Aunt Sandy: 175
Lauren: 170
Lindsey: 145
Potter: 145
Do not be discouraged if you are pretty far down in the standings. The majority of the points right now comes from endorsements.
As of now, Joe Biden is crushing everyone with the major endorsements. He has ten (I used 538’s endorsement tracker, which is fantastic by the way, and decided our major endorsements would be the ones that are characterized by them as five points and above). The next closest candidate has three and that is Amy Klobuchar.
In the minor endorsements, Kamala Harris is the big leader. She has 140 points (or 28 endorsements so far). Cory Booker is next with 90 points. After that we have Joe Biden at 75 points. In case you were wondering, Eric Swalwell has one endorsement.
For the debates, every candidate except four (Wayne Messam, Steve Bullock, Mike Gravel, and Seth Moulton) received five points for being invited. It was difficult to determine clear winners from both nights, so I just gave wins to Elizabeth Warren, Julian Castro, Cory Booker, and Kamala Harris. I feel like every outlet said someone different was the winner. I figured that those four seemed to do the best because of the debate (again, 538 had some interesting data on it), so they all got points.
I amended the idea of scandals to include gaffes and just negative stories in general. I decided to award Biden one for the comments about working with Segregationists back in the day and then saying that one of them never called him boy. I also figured Pete Buttigieg should get a negative for the police shooting. I know, it was not his fault, but it was in the news and it definitely did not make him look good (his response at the debate though helped him out). I know, these things happened before the debates so technically the league was not even officially started yet, but…well I gave points for endorsements and they will have to answer questions about these things.
I decided against knocking Klobuchar for the whole yelling at staffer thing. I am not certain if that was a scandal. And since I did not like counting that thing, I did not count the stuff from Sanders campaign either. If you have a scandal/gaff/something you think should be included, just send it to me and I will make a ruling. If I am not sure, I will consult with a few other folks and get their opinion (which is what I did with the Hickenlooper staff leaving for Buttigieg’s campaign).
Finally, we have the Trump Twitter mentions. I think some of you were hoping this would be a huge earner. I honestly do not think it will be that big, but who knows.
Anyways, I gave all of the candidates that were in the debates points because he made general comments about everyone on stage each night. I also gave everyone points for his Tweet the other day when he said something about “this crew” which meant all of the Democrats running. He did reference Joe Biden and his votes on super predators. He also mentioned Sleepy Joe and Crazy Bernie the day after the debates. If Hillary ran, she would probably rack up a bunch of these points.
It is too late to join the contest, but feel free to join the Facebook group. We have plenty of great discussions there.
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