How Missouri splits its delegates for president

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- Missouri will be the smallest of the available prizes Tuesday, as voters in five states make their presidential choices in primary elections.

There will be 71 Democratic delegates and 52 Republican delegates at stake in Missouri. Greater amounts will be available in Florida, Illinois, North Carolina and Ohio. Missouri's delegates are likely to be split among several candidates, though each party uses different rules for determining that. Here are some things to know about Missouri's presidential primaries:

Make a choice

Polls will be open from 6 a.m. to 7 p.m. today. All registered voters can participate in Missouri's presidential primaries. They will have to pick a ballot for one party -- Democrat, Libertarian or Republican -- but there is no party registration and no record of which party people choose. The Republican ballot will feature 12 candidates, the Democratic ballot nine and the Libertarian ballot five.

Democratic delegates

Missouri has 84 delegates to the Democratic National Convention. Thirteen of those are superdelegates -- party leaders or officials who can support whomever they choose. That leaves 71 delegates that could be apportioned based on the primary results. Forty-seven of those will be divvied based on how well candidates do in each of Missouri's eight congressional districts, with anyone getting at least 15 percent of the vote qualifying to receive delegates. The remainder of the delegates will be divided among candidates based on their statewide vote, with 15 percent again the minimum threshold to get delegates. That means Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders both are likely to receive some of Missouri's delegates.

Republican delegates

Missouri has 52 delegates to the Republican National Convention. The state Republican Party is awarding delegates only to candidates who still are actively campaigning -- Ted Cruz, John Kasich, Jim Lynch, Marco Rubio and Donald Trump. If anyone receives a majority of the votes cast for active candidates, he would get all 52 delegates. If not, delegates would be awarded as follows: 12 for the candidate who gets the most votes statewide and five for every congressional district a candidate wins. That means one candidate could get all of Missouri's delegates if he wins every congressional district, or the delegates could be split among candidates depending on who fares best in each of the state's eight districts.

Primary revival

Missouri's presidential primary will be the first meaningful one since 2008. In that year, President Barack Obama edged Clinton in the statewide vote, but they ended up splitting the available delegates. Republicans used a winner-take-all approach in 2008, meaning John McCain got all of Missouri's delegates even though he received just one-third of the total votes in a close contest against Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney.

In 2012, Missouri's primaries lacked much significance. As the incumbent, Obama faced little Democratic competition. Republicans didn't use the primary -- held in February that year -- as the basis for awarding delegates. That's because they would have been penalized by the national party for holding a vote too early in the campaign season. Instead, Republicans used later caucus meetings to allot their delegates.