Bernie Sanders Wins West Virginia Primary, But The Race Remains Unchanged

In politics, not all victories add up to a win. Just ask Bernie Sanders, who won West Virginia's Democratic primary on Tuesday, but whose chances of becoming the party's nominee still remain the same — essentially zero.

In one of the few remaining primary contests left, the Vermont senator was declared the winner in West Virginia by MSNBC the moment polls closed on Tuesday, before results had even begun to trickle in. With 80 percent of precincts reporting, Sanders led Hillary Clinton 51-36 percent. Fully 13 percent of West Virginians voted "other" in the Democratic primary.

But Sanders' win in West Virginia won't substantially change the Democratic primary race. The state is a small battleground, with only 29 Democratic delegates up for grabs, a majority of which will go to Sanders. Even with a huge lead over Clinton, Sanders is currently forecasted to take 14 delegates, while Clinton will carry 10. The other 5 delegates will be allocated as votes are tallied and finalized.

Even with his West Virginia victory, there are not enough pledged delegates remaining in the race for Sanders to win the Democratic nomination before the convention. Clinton still leads him by hundreds of pledged delegates and the Vermont senator would have to convince a substantial number of her superdelegates to suddenly have a change of heart in order to take the nomination away from her at this point.

Still, Clinton hasn't completely taken her eye off of the primary race. After shutting down campaign advertising against Sanders to save money for the general election, her campaign on Monday purchased ad time in Kentucky ahead of the state's primary on May 17, Politico reported.

Sanders celebrated his victory Tuesday night in an email to supporters. "Every vote we earn and every delegate we secure sends an unmistakable message about the values we share, the country's support for the ideas of our campaign, and a rejection of Donald Trump and his values," he said.

Sanders' victory in West Virginia did not come as a surprise. The polls showed him with a slight edge over Clinton heading into Tuesday. What's more, the demographics of the state, which is 93 percent white and largely working class, worked in the senator's favor, as did the state's open primary, which allowed independents to vote in the contest. Sanders has done exceptionally well in states whose Democratic base is majority white, while Clinton has performed best in states with large African-American populations. As FiveThirtyEight pointed out, the only states whiter than West Virginia are Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont, all of which have also been huge victories for Sanders.

Sanders' message of economic populism resonated especially among blue-collar voters in the poor, rural corners of West Virginia. The state used to be dominated by the coal and mining industries but those jobs have since largely disappeared in favor of new clean energy practices, eviscerating many of the coal-mining communities that relied on them.

Clinton, on the other hand, came into West Virginia facing an uphill battle. In March, the former secretary of state said at a CNN town hall that her clean energy policies would "put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business." These comments did her no favors in coal country, and Sanders quickly jumped on Clinton's remarks while campaigning in West Virginia. She later apologized, but apparently it was too little, too late.

On the Republican side, Donald Trump won primaries in Nebraska and West Virginia on Tuesday. But considering that Donald Trump is the presumptive nominee with no other rivals remaining in the race, neither contest will have much impact on his march to the nomination. The reality television star-turned GOP standard bearer, began Tuesday night with 1,020 delegates and was just 217 of getting the number necessary to clinch the nomination before the party's convention in July.

Clinton and Sanders, meanwhile, have set their eyes on future primaries. In addition to buying air time in Kentucky, Clinton spent Tuesday in Lexington and will travel to New Jersey on Wednesday, ahead of that state's primary on June 7. Sanders, meanwhile, has moved on to California, which is the final big prize of the primary season (and also votes on June 7), in the hopes of wresting at least some of the pledged delegates away from Clinton and gaining some momentum to help convince superdelegates to turn on her at the convention.

Sanders said in an email to supporters Tuesday night that the campaign expects to do well in Kentucky, as well as Oregon, both of which will vote on May 17 and could set up a strong month for the candidate. But those states carry a combined 135 delegates, seven fewer than New Jersey alone and less than a quarter of the 546 delegates at stake in California, which will round out the Democratic primary race on June 7.

"We fully acknowledge we have an uphill climb ahead of us, but we're used to that," Sanders said in the email. "We have been fighting uphill from the day this campaign began, and we're going to stay in the race until the last vote is cast."

But unless something truly unprecedented happens — even by the standards of this year's election — between now and the July conventions, it's still Clinton vs. Trump until November.

Follow Olivia Becker on Twitter: @oliviaLbecker