We may only have three or four candidates by Super Tuesday, but nine will be receiving votes.

In Some things are both inconsequential and incomprehensible this morning, I referenced the results from the New Hampshire primary. When I had looked them up, I was surprised how many votes some candidates had who had dropped out some time ago: Cory Booker dropped out January 13, 2020 and yet received 154 votes, Kamala Harris dropped on December 3rd 2019, two months ago and yet received 104 votes, Marianne Williamson dropped January 10, 2010 received 95 votes. There are others.

These aren't big numbers of course. But bigger than I would expect for people who dropped weeks or months ago. I was puzzled but assumed either that the ballots were printed so far in advance that names remained on them which were no loger viable or that die-hard loyalists must be writing them in.

Well, no. There is another explanation I had not considered. From Takeaways From New Hampshire by Sean Trende.

5. Voting is already happening in “Super Tuesday” elections.

We typically think of races in terms of momentum – a candidate wins Iowa, which propels her into New Hampshire, which thrusts her toward the nomination. But the advent of early voting – where ballots can be cast before Election Day – scrambles that calculus. People have been voting in Super Tuesday states such as California for days, and in Minnesota, Vermont, and Michigan for weeks. Early voting in Tennessee, North Carolina, Arkansas and Texas opens this week. And so on.

There are a few takeaways here. First, if the field were to winnow, thousands – perhaps millions – of votes will be cast for candidates no longer running. In other words, with every passing day it becomes more difficult for the race to winnow meaningfully. We may only have three or four candidates by Super Tuesday, but nine will be receiving votes.

For that reason, the 15% threshold becomes crucial. To receive delegates, a candidate must receive 15% of the votes in a given jurisdiction. When the number of candidates exceeds three or four, it becomes difficult to hit that number. Bernie Sanders’ 25% of the vote could turn into 100% of the delegates if he is the only candidate in the race reaching the 15% threshold. Moreover, if he receives delegates in every state, but the other candidates hit the threshold in varying states, he can build up a delegate lead by default.

In addition, former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg has been running ads in Super Tuesday states – and did so during the Super Bowl, no less -- while his opponents were tearing at each other’s hair. Sooner or later, Bloomberg will be subjected to scrutiny and negative ads, but by that point millions of voters in Super Tuesday states will have cast ballots in a universe where they have only seen positive Bloomberg spots. This has the potential to upend the race completely.

That's what is reflected in the New Hampshire results. New Hampshire does not have early voting but it does have absentee voting and these small number of votes are almost certainly the result of someone weeks and months ago knowing they would be out of state on February 11 and mailing in an absentee ballot. For a candidate who happened to be defunct by the time February 11 rolled around as it turns out.

And that's with absentee ballots. Imagine the numbers where early voting is permitted. Trende is right, that is probably going to be kind of consequential in ways not easily anticipated.