Staff members said it is not clear whether the party’s affirmative action rules would meet or fail these standards.

According to staff and DNC documents, the party rules now call for the equal distribution of delegates between men and women and require states to have plans with specific goals and timetables to achieve appropriate representations of five groups:blacks, Hispanics, Native Americans, Asian Pacific Americans and women.

The goal is to achieve their participation in rough proportion to their participation in each state’s Democratic primary.

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Although there are no specific quotas for racial and ethnic groupsstates must make their best efforts to achieve the goals and do not automatically fall into noncompliance if they fail-state delegations to the national convention are supposed to have equal numbers of men and women.