217k registered, 96,921 waiting for validation

Venezuelans abroad showed up for the primary registration. While this number may seem small next to the 8 million+ diaspora, remember that you have to filter children and folks have never been registered to vote. It is likely that this number will look robust once we see the total participation in October.

Capriles Won’t Debate

Yesterday, Henrique Capriles gave a 45 minute speech in which he spoke about MCM’s clear lead in polls and about the importance of keeping a united front against the dictatorship. Awesome. But then, he said he wouldn’t participate in this week’s primary candidate debate, because Venezuela no está para debates. A debate would be counterproductive for unity, he said, so he decided to break from the group and skip this one.

Take note of this excerpt from a June PRR

“The tone of the Capriles campaign suggests one of two options. First, and the most simplistic approach, is that it’s a poorly thought out primary campaign based on a misunderstanding of what it takes to win the opposition primary: hardline opposition voters will likely carry more weight than dissatisfied chavista voters, and therefore the candidate who can mobilize more of the former has the upper hand against a candidate that’s focused on the latter. A strategy focusing on dissatisfied chavista voters makes sense in the presidential election, not in the opposition primary, a fact that leads to the second option: Capriles is not campaigning for the primary but for the presidential election, because he doesn’t expect the primary will happen and that he’ll find a way to be the consensus candidate. We believe the second option is the more likely explanation for his strategy.”

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