2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: Hillary supporters: How is Hillary's and your claiming victory prematurely going to unite the party? [View all]onenote
(42,870 posts)Obama claimed victory the day he had a combination of pledged delegates and commitments from super delegates sufficient to give him the nomination when formally acted on at the convention.
If Clinton waits until after the California vote is in, she would be in the exact same fact since by that point she, like Obama, will have a majority of the pledged delegates. But let's say she gets 50 percent in New Jersey and 40 percent in New Mexico and that information is known before the 11 o'clock new back east and she times her victory announcement for between 10:30-11:00 (before the CA polls close but after they've been open for more than 12 hours). If she needs fewer than 30 percent of the delegates in CA (which would be the case under my scenario), and she has additional super d commitments, then there is no reason for her not to make her speech at that time rather than wait until after 11 pm east coast time.
I will give you this much. If she fails to get 50 percent in NJ, she should hold off until after 11.