After 3 Big Wins out West, Bernie Sanders Sees 'Path Toward Victory'
— -- Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders says don’t count him out of the presidential race just yet.
Sanders scored three more victories against Hillary Clinton on Saturday, winning caucuses in Alaska, Washington state and Hawaii. He earned at least 70 percent of the votes in each contest.
But despite those impressive wins, Sanders still trails Clinton substantially in the delegate count, largely because of her lead among superdelegates.
Based on ABC News' delegate estimates, Sanders needs to win 73 percent of the remaining delegates to clinch the nomination. He disagreed.
“No, I don’t accept that. That is not the case,” Sanders said Sunday on ABC's "This Week." “I will not deny for one second that we still remain the underdogs, but we have come a long, long way, you will have to concede, in the last 10 months. We do have a path toward victory.”
Sanders believes his recent string of victories shows he can not only win the Democratic nomination, but also succeed in the general election, including against Republican Party frontrunner Donald Trump.
“We won three landslides last night. We won six out of seven contests in the last 11 days. We’ve cut Secretary Clinton’s lead by a third during that period of time,” said Sanders. "A national poll just came out that had us one point ahead of Secretary Clinton when we started 60 points behind, and every national and state poll that I have seen, virtually every one, has us defeating Donald Trump."
Sanders said superdelegates could be the key to helping him clinch a come-from-behind victory.
“I think the superdelegates are going to have make a very difficult decision, and that is if a candidate wins in a state by 40 or 50 points, who are you going to give your vote to?” Sanders told ABC's Jonathan Karl. “Second of all, which candidate is better positioned to defeat Trump or any of the other Republican candidates? I think a lot of the superdelegates are going to conclude that it’s Bernie Sanders.”
Some critics have expressed concern that a continued battle between the Democratic candidates could hurt the party in November. But Sanders said his criticisms of Clinton are important during the nomination process.
“That’s what a campaign is about," he said. "I do not run negative ads, but clearly contrasting my position with Secretary Clinton’s is what a campaign is supposed to be about."
