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Pete Buttigieg, Sanders in near tie in Iowa with 100% of results released

The former mayor leads Sen. Bernie Sanders in state delegate equivalents, but Sanders is leading in actual voting.

Nearly three days after the Iowa Caucuses, the Iowa Democratic Party announced Thursday night the release of 100% of the state caucus results. 

As of Thursday night, the IDP results showed Pete Buttigieg winning the most delegates over Sen. Bernie Sanders, 564 to 562. At this point, Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, is leading Sanders by 0.1 percentage points in state delegate equivalents. 

Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts remains in third, followed by former Vice President Joe Biden and Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota.

The results could change as Democratic National Committee Chair Tom Perez called on Iowa party officials earlier in the day to recanvass the vote. Many news outlets, including the Associated Press have yet to declare a winner because of the irregularities so far. 

Although Sanders trails in state delegate equivalents, the results show Sanders won in both the first vote -- which is the initial preference -- and the final vote -- after voters switched to a different candidate following the first round.

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The Associated Press says it will declare the winner based on the number of state delegate equivalents each candidate receives. That's because Democrats use delegates to choose their overall nominee.

Much of the political world has already shifted its attention to New Hampshire, which votes on Tuesday. Seven candidates will hold one more debate on Friday night before the vote. The five candidates who finished at the top in Iowa will be joined on stage by entrepreneur Andrew Yang and billionaire Tom Steyer.

The chaos surrounding the reporting breakdown has undermined the impact of Iowa's election, which typically rewards winners with a surge of momentum. There are already calls for Iowa to not only lose its status as the first election contest in the nation, but also to abandon the caucus format.

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