NH's Gardner Indicates Granite State Presidential Primary Will Stay a Week Ahead of Other States

FHQ loves it when New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill Gardner comes along and says in a sentence or two what FHQ has spent months trying to tell our readers and other passersby. Here is what Gardner had to say to John DiStaso of the Manchester Union-Leader:

“In the end, if it's Nevada going on the 18th, then we're not going on the 14th, but I don't think it's going to be Nevada in the end” that prompts an earlier date for New Hampshire.

It is funny that Gardner should say this on the very day that I questioned on The Daily Rundown how strictly he would observe the New Hampshire election law that requires not only at least a seven day window before the primary (Iowa usually holds its caucuses eight days in advance of the New Hampshire primary.) but a similar buffer after the contest as well. FHQ has said for a while now that the tentative dates that are out there for the first four states are just that, tentative. In fact, they are a DNC creation that not all of the first four states are recognizing. The RNC only requires that Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina go no earlier than February. The Iowa and Nevada Republican Parties have gone along with that plan, penciling in their caucuses for the DNC-mandated dates (February 6 and 18 respectively), but nothing formal or otherwise has come out of either New Hampshire or South Carolina.

Gardner knows better.

And he basically put a death knell in the Nevada-just-four-days-after-New-Hampshire plan with just one statement. That, in turn, means that New Hampshire will likely go a full week and a half before either Nevada or Nevada/South Carolina if both choose to hold Saturday contests.

Now, folks may be wondering, "Well, what about 2008?" The 2008 calendar put both Iowa and New Hampshire behind the eight ball. Iowa's caucuses were pushed right up against New Year's Day on January 3, and New Hampshire positioned itself just five days later, but a full seven days ahead of the non-compliant January 15 primary in Michigan. In 2008, New Hampshire for months was tentatively penciled in for January 22, but Gardner laid waste to that notion by holding out until all the other states settled their dates before scheduling New Hampshire's (as close to compliant with the state law as he could get without pushing Iowa into December and out of compliance with the national party rules).

January 22, 2008 was never the date of the New Hampshire primary where it counted: with Bill Gardner. And February 14, 2012 was never likely to be the date of the Granite state primary either unless, of course, no states defied the rules.

That hasn't happened and neither will February 14.

...for New Hampshire anyway.

--
What does this mean for the final calendar? Well, it means what it always means: that New Hampshire is very likely to be the last player to make a move in this date setting process. Beyond that, however, it means that New Hampshire won't settle for just a four day buffer between it and the third state to hold a primary or caucus. Gardner appears to think that that third state could be Missouri or Wisconsin. FHQ has gotten assurances from folks on the ground in Nevada, though, that Republicans in the Silver state will move up to stay within the first four states grouping. This is now the second time that Gardner has brought up Wisconsin as a rogue state. He may know something that FHQ does not, but by all indications, the Badger state move to April in moving along as planned. Governor Walker has some say in the matter -- he could veto the measure -- but I have seen nothing, pro or con, to signal what Walker is likely to do. Missouri is a threat, but as I said yesterday, I'm less pessimistic about the move to March in the Show Me state than I was on the evening the news broke about the hold up of the legislation in the state Senate.

But what does it mean for the calendar?

January 23: Iowa
January 31: New Hampshire
February 7: Minnesota, (Missouri*)
February 11: Nevada
February 18: South Carolina
February 21: Florida, Georgia (Wisconsin*)
February 28: Arizona, Michigan

*Assuming neither Missouri nor Wisconsin move their primaries.

Now, this is completely speculative, but it does take into account the information that we have at the moment; information that can and will very likely change in a heartbeat.

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Members of President Preference Primary Date Selection Committee Named in Florida

Speaking of the Presidential Preference Primary Date Selection Committee...

With the clock ticking down to the October 1 deadline by which state law requires a decision on the date of the Florida presidential primary to be made, Governor Rick Scott, House Speaker Dean Cannon and Senate President Mike Haridopolos today named the members of the committee to complete that task.¹ The nine member -- three members chosen by the governor and the state House and Senate leaders -- Presidential Preference Primary Date Selection Committee (PPPDSC) is made up of six Republicans and three Democrats. The three Republican leaders had to select at least one Democrat based on the law behind the creation of the PPPDSC. That explains the 6-3 Republican advantage on the committee.

The nine members according to Michael Bender at The Buzz (St. Petersburg Times) are: 

Republicans: Jenn Ungru, former Gov. Bob Marinez, Sens. John Thrasher of St. Augustine and Rene Garcia of Hialeah, and Reps. Carlos Lopez Cantera of Miami and Seth McKeel of Lakeland.

Democrats: Sen. Gary Siplin of Orlando, former Sen. Al Lawson and state Rep. Cynthia Stafford of Miami.

The News Service of Florida is reporting that the PPPDSC is set to have its first meeting next week on Friday, September 23. That is just eight days prior to the deadline for a date decision. It is also a date that overlaps with the planned Presidency V event which will bring some of the Republican presidential hopefuls to the state for a debate and straw poll. A second meeting is scheduled the following Friday; the day before the October 1 deadline.

UPDATE: Of the six legislative members of the committee (four of which are Republicans), one, John Thrasher, has already endorsed Romney. Here is the full list of Florida Republican endorsements thus far..

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¹ Here are the press releases from...
Scott:

Today, Florida Governor Rick Scott announced his three choices for Florida’s Presidential Preference Primary Date Selection Committee.
Former Republican Governor Bob Martinez served as Florida’s 40th governor from 1987 to 1991. Before that he served as the mayor of Tampa, the city where he was born.
Former Democrat Senator Al Lawson represented Floridians from 11 panhandle counties from 2001 to 2011 in the state senate, and before that he served nearly two decades in the Florida House of Representatives.
Jenn Ungru, a Republican, is Governor Scott’s deputy chief of staff with oversight responsibilities over the Department of State. She has served in the Scott administration since the inauguration and has more than a decade of campaign and election experience in Florida and nationwide.

Cannon:

Please find attached my correspondence to Secretary of State Kurt Browning appointing the following House Members to the Presidential Preference Primary Date Selection Committee:
Representative Carlos Lopez-Cantera
Representative Seth McKeel
Representative Cynthia Stafford

Haridopolos:

Senate President Mike Haridopolos (R-Merritt Island) today announced the appointment of Senators Rene Garcia, Gary Siplin and John Thrasher to the Presidential Preference Primary Committee.
Senator Rene Garcia (R-Hialeah) currently represents Florida Senate District 40, which consists of part of Miami-Dade County.  Garcia first was elected to the Senate in 2010.  Prior to serving in the Florida Senate, Garcia was a member of the Florida House of Representatives from 2000-2008.
Senator Gary Siplin (D-Orlando) currently represents Florida Senate District 19, which consists of parts of Orange and Osceola Counties.  Siplin was first elected to the Senate in 2002 and was subsequently reelected.  Prior to serving in the Florida Senate, Siplin was a member of the Florida House of Representatives from 2000-2002.
Senator John Thrasher (R-St. Augustine) currently represents Florida Senate District 8, which consists of parts of Duval, Flagler, Nassau, St. Johns and Volusia Counties.  Thrasher was first elected to the Senate in 2009 and was subsequently reelected.  Prior to serving in the Florida Senate, Thrasher was a member of the Florida House of Representatives from 1992-2000; he also served as Speaker of the Florida House from 1998-2000.

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The Florida Presidential Primary is Not Currently Scheduled for January 31

One question that FHQ gets periodically is about whether Florida is or is not scheduled -- according to state election law -- on the last Tuesday in January. As has been recounted in great detail in this space over the last several months, the state legislature ceded the authority to schedule the presidential primary date to the newly created Presidential Preference Primary Date Selection Committee (PPPDSC).

But the question remains: Is the PPPDSC making a decision to change the date from January 31 in the 2012 cycle or are they working from a blank slate (with the ability to set the date between the first Tuesday in January and the first Tuesday in March)?

Admittedly, FHQ has done a poor job of relating this to our readers as well as a broader audience, and I would like to set the record straight once and for all. The enrolled version of HB 1355 -- the bill that created the PPPDSC -- strikes the reference in the presidential primary law to the last Tuesday in January (see 103.101(1)(b) for the details). And the 2011 Florida Statutes reflect that change (see the same 103.101(1)(b) section).

In other words, the Florida primary is completely date-less at this point in the evolution of the 2012 presidential primary calendar and has been since May 19 when the bill was signed into law.  The PPPDSC will not be moving the primary back from that last Tuesday in January date. Instead, the members are charged with selecting a date in the window between January 3 and March 6 (for the 2012 cycle). Florida could still end up on January 31, but it will only be because it sees a threat to its desired fifth position from a state like Missouri -- should a move to March in the Show Me state prove impossible -- or Minnesota -- where Republican caucuses are currently scheduled for February 7.

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Ohio May Presidential Primary Bill -- Sans Emergency Clause -- Passes State House

Despite all the uproar from Ohio House Democrats earlier in the week, the Republican majority today went ahead with separate pieces of legislation dealing with a new redistricting proposal and moving the Buckeye state presidential primary back to May. House Democrats, upset with the new district maps, threatened to withhold support for the bill moving the presidential primary from March to May. As FHQ pointed out in the post linked above, however, the Democratic threat was only applicable if Republicans were insistent about the measure taking effect immediately. The House majority apparently was not, as the emergency clause -- the mechanism by which the law would have taken effect upon gubernatorial signature -- was removed and the bill was passed by the full House. Instead of taking effect immediately, the bill would become law 90 days after being signed by Governor John Kasich (R).

HB 318 -- the House version of SB 217 -- now heads to the Senate for consideration, and the Ohio primary is one step closer to moving to the first Tuesday after the first Monday in May for the second time.

NOTE: The Ohio legislative website does not have the vote tally up at this time, but the AP is reporting the bill has passed and the page for HB 318 marks the bill "As passed by the House".

UPDATE: The final vote was 63-29 in favor of HB 318.

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FHQ on The Daily Rundown

                                   

[Somewhere in the background Carly Simon music is playing.]

I have complained in the past about the coverage of the 2012 presidential primary calendar, but I don't have anyone to blame on this one but myself if I don't like it. Well, I could blame it on the questions I got.

Yeah, that's the scapegoat.

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Michigan Senate Passes February 28 Presidential Primary Bill

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Michigan Senate Passes February 28 Presidential Primary Bill

The Michigan state Senate just passed an amended version of SB 584 by a vote of 25-12. The legislation initially called for the creation of a committee, similar to the Presidential Preference Primary Date Selection Committee in Florida, to set a date for the Wolverine state presidential primary by October 1. The committee idea was scrapped in the amended version, and some additional technical language in the law was cleaned up. However, the date called for in the current law -- the fourth Tuesday in February -- was left untouched. That, in turn, means that if this bill passes the state House and is signed into law by Governor Rick Snyder (R), Michigan will be locked into February 28.

But why was legislation necessary if the date will not be changed? Other than the changes in the language of the law, the biggest addition was a provision closing off the primary to independents, non-partisans and Democrats. The amended bill calls for voters to indicate in writing -- on a form to be created by the Michigan secretary of state -- which presidential primary in which the voter will participate. The guidelines from the Michigan Republican Party State Committee discussed a few weeks ago additionally indicated that that information -- who had requested what ballot -- would be made public as some measure of enforcement.

For our purposes at FHQ, however, the important aspect of this is that there is now a plan in place to lock Michigan into a February 28 presidential primary date. In other words, if this bill becomes law, Michigan is no more or less threatening to the overall state of the 2012 presidential primary calendar than Arizona represents on the same date. This would change nothing other than to add Michigan to the calendar in a more formal way.

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A Footnote to the Missouri Presidential Primary Situation

One thing that occurred to FHQ overnight is that there is one other alternative that should and very likely will be considered/reconsidered in the process of resolving the date on which the Missouri presidential primary will fall in 2012. We have gone to great lengths to include the possibility of a veto override of SB 282 in most special session Missouri posts, but failed to adequately consider that yesterday in light on the new snag in the Show Me state Senate. Suddenly, an override of the veto on the broad elections bill that included a provision to move the presidential primary to March.

Why?

Well, if the alternative to Republicans both chambers of the Missouri General Assembly and Democrats -- in the state House in particular -- is a non-compliant primary or caucus on February, those members may feel some pressure to reconsider an override of SB 282. That bill would obviously move the primary to March 6. Now, I know I was hard on Sen. Crowell and those writing this amendment in yesterday's post, but if that was merely a sideshow to wider attempt at pressuring at least four Democratic House members into joining forces with the House Republican majority, then perhaps I'm not giving them enough credit. The Republican majority in the Senate, you see, is large enough on its own to override Governor Jay Nixon's veto, but in the House the Republican majority would need the help of at least four Democrats for an override there.

If the Senate is trying to cut off every option but the veto override as a means of moving the primary, then they are off to a pretty good start of setting up a roadblock on this particular piece of legislation (HB 3). According to the Missouri Constitution (Article III, Section 32), a veto session can happen for up to ten days starting on the first Wednesday after the second Monday in September. That coincidentally enough will overlap with the remainder of the special session.

If, on the other hand, Democrats don't particularly care about a switch to a caucus -- and with the potential for a state mandate on that type of contest, they likely will -- then they can call the Republicans bluff and set up a potential fight between the Republican majorities in the General Assembly and the state and national Republican Parties.

Regardless, it will be interesting to see this one plays out over the next couple of weeks.

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Strange Things Are Afoot in the Missouri Senate Concerning the Presidential Primary

***Please also see the footnote FHQ has added to the Missouri presidential primary situation.

In the Missouri Senate today, the chamber took up HB 3, the bill to move the Show Me state presidential primary from the first Tuesday after the first Monday in February to the first Tuesday after the first Monday in March. Instead of considering and passing the measure to bring the state's primary back into compliance with the national party rules quickly, as the House had done last week, the process appears to have hit a snag in the state Senate -- a snag that will not be rectified until at least next Wednesday (September 21) when the Senate reconvenes.

At issue is proposed amendment to eliminate the separate presidential primary election -- saving the state $6 million -- and reverting to caucuses as a means of allocating delegates as was the custom in the state prior to 1988 (and again in both 1992 and 1996). The amendment would also call on the Missouri caucuses to be held on February 7 (something that is rarely covered by state law elsewhere across the country).

But this is where the wheels fell off of the wagon. The legislators carrying on the conversation on the floor of the now-adjourned Senate session this afternoon showed a fundamental lack of understanding about how the presidential primary process works.¹ Senator Jason Crowell (R-27th, Bollinger) demonstrated the very real disconnect that can exist in this presidential nomination process between the state legislature/state government and both the state party and particularly the national party.

[Forgive me for paraphrasing what I just overheard and attempted to transcribe from the online audio of the session this afternoon, but these do adequately point out the aforementioned disconnect.]

Sen. Crowell brought up things like:

I've never heard from anyone from the national party who asked us to move to March.
Why should the national party tell us how to run our primary?
This is nothing more than the national party trying to rig the system to pick the nominees they want.

Then there was this exchange between the bill's Senate handler, Kevin Engler (R-3rd, Farmington) and Sen. Crowell [These are direct quotes.]:

Engler: "Will the [national] party strip us of our delegates?" 

Crowell: "I don't care. I don't care."

There are so many things to discuss here that FHQ really doesn't know where to start. I'll quickly dispense with the fundamentals of this and then talk briefly about the implications moving forward.

First of all, there is an overlap on this issue in terms of the national party attempting to nominate presidential candidates and the fact that states have chosen, on the whole, to complete their end of the process through state-funded presidential primaries. Initially, why that came be was a matter of state-level convenience in the 1970s after the McGovern-Fraser commission reformed the Democratic process (and ultimately the Republican process, too). States moved to primaries as a means of fulfilling the desires of the new national party rules. It was easier to put an extra presidential primary line on the ballot of a pre-existing primary for state and local offices in some cases than it was for state parties to hold caucuses on their own dime. That overlap, though, has blurred the line between state action and national/state party function over time. The nomination process is party business, but that is a machine that happens to include a state mandated cog, the primary election. That connection only lasts as long as is convenient for the national and state parties.

And in this case, it is clear that at least some Republicans within the Missouri legislature have grown tired of the mandates from the national party. The interesting thing is that there was no discussion of how Republican legislative action in the Missouri General Assembly would affect the Missouri Republican Party's ability to allocated delegates to the national convention. There was absolutely no discussion of this. FHQ isn't clear if the senators talking to fill in the time while the amendment was being written are even considering this. There are implications for the state parties. The parties will have to pick up the tab for the caucuses in the event that the primary funding is eliminated. It isn't clear to me that the state parties have even been consulted on this matter. And the parties could very well take the issue to court if the legislature attempts to regulate when the caucuses could be held. That is party business and the courts have continually shown that they will side with parties over states on these issues. [Imagine a court battle to determine when the Missouri primary or caucuses will be held and the impact that would have on the finalization of the calendar. Look no further than the court battle over the Michigan primary in 2008.]

Again, I don't want to get to far into that sort of speculation. The more you look into it, the messier it gets. The very real impact that this has is that suddenly the Missouri primary scheduling is now in doubt. The roadblocks that are apparent in the Senate raise the specter of a February 7 primary or caucus which would obviously bring with it near-Arizona-style panic about the state of the final calendar.

What, then, are we left with? The amendment, if passed, could derail the process in any number of ways. It could make the overall bill unpalatable to first the entire Senate (unlikely since the whole chamber would have to have voted for the amendment's inclusion in the first place), the House or the governor. If the amended bill passes the Senate, the House could reject it. Conversely, the House could accept the changes -- signing on to the caucus scenario based on the savings -- and send the bill on to the governor. Governor Nixon would then face two options: Veto the legislation that would save the state $6 million and in the process keep the primary on its non-compliant date, or sign it, wash his hands of the matter and let the Missouri Republicans take the brunt of the heat for holding or attempting to hold a non-compliant caucus (something that would cost the state party half its delegation to the Tampa convention). But the question remains on that latter option of whether the Missouri Republican Party would be on board with the change; particularly if it entails the state government mandating when the caucuses -- party business, mind you -- can be held.

What would stop the state party from moving the caucuses where they want? Nothing would. But there could potentially be a fight over that between the state party and the state government. Of course, the state government would be unlikely to bring a suit to court considering the attorney general is a Democrat.

This Missouri situation just got ugly and we won't begin to have any answers on the matter until next Wednesday; a scant ten days before the RNC requires states to have notified the party of their delegate selection plans.

...but that isn't anything that would upset the members of the Missouri Senate's majority.

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¹ Mostly, this was Senator Crowell, but it mirrors to some extent the actions of Sen. Brad Lager, who had previously offered an amendment to the regular session presidential primary bill to anchor the Missouri primary to one week after the New Hampshire primary. The amendment was accepted on that bill (SB 282) and ultimately passed by the Senate and then re-modified back in the House. That version, including a provision to move the primary to March was agreed to by both chambers and then vetoed by the Governor Jay Nixon (D) due to other provisions in the bill.

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The Post-Arizona Lay of the 2012 Presidential Primary Land

FHQ is glad that the Missouris, Ohios and Wisconsins served as a distraction to the bevy of news items that emerged yesterday concerning the 2012 presidential primary calendar. As has become quite usual, there was an overreaction throughout the political press to the news that Arizona Governor Jan Brewer had solidified the Grand Canyon state presidential primary date on February 28. Calls of calendar mania and chaos were rampant, and FHQ might add, completely unwarranted.¹ The simple truth of the matter is that Arizona has been set for -- at the latest -- February 28 since the state legislature there adjourned back in April. After that it was all up to Governor Brewer to decide if the primary would or should be moved to an earlier date. Brewer never had, without the state legislature's help, the ability to move the Arizona presidential primary back.

None of this stopped the anyone from trumpeting the arrival of calendar chaos after the press release announcing Brewer's decision on the primary, nor did the fact that the opposite was actually a more accurate indication of reality. In less than two weeks, we have gone from the possibility of Brewer scheduling the Arizona primary on January 31, creating a scramble to the front, to Brewer leaving the primary on February 28 with the same reaction. It isn't chaos now and it never was. Chaos requires some measure of uncertainty and Arizona on February 28 at the latest has not been uncertain for a while now. As FHQ mentioned in our back of the napkin reactions last night, if anything, this clears up the picture even further. One more piece of the puzzle is in place. Sure, Arizona is now officially non-compliant, will lose half its delegates and shift up by at least a week any and all states that will, want or have the ability to go ahead of it. A week, not a month.

In addition, there are now very few states that can actually still jump on the early and non-compliant bandwagon and have a willingness to do so.

• Florida can. The Presidential Preference Primary Date Selection Committee can schedule the primary in the Sunshine state for any date between January 3 and March 6 and has to do so before October 1, 2011.
• Georgia can. Depending on when the decision is made, Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp can schedule the Peach state primary for as early as January 1. If Kemp waits until his December 1 deadline, he will still have the ability to schedule a Tuesday contest for as early as January 31, given the 60 days he is required to give elections officials between the time the decision is made and when the primary is. 
• Michigan can. The year-round state legislative session allows Michigan the latitude to set a date that other states with early and already-adjourned state legislative sessions do not possess. 
• Colorado can. The state Republican Party has the option of shifting its date up, based on state elections law, from the first Tuesday in March to the first Tuesday in February. The party's willingness to carry through with such a move is predicated on a calculation of how competitive the GOP nomination race is at both of those points (February 7 vs. March 6).
• The remaining Republican caucus states (Alaska, Maine, North Dakota and Washington) can. To this point, however, not much is known about what the intentions are in each of those states. 
• Wisconsin, Missouri and New Jersey can. But it appears that legislation has very nearly cleared the legislative stage in each and the decision to move out of February is up to the executive branch at this point. That movement is backward, however. The threat from these states, to the extent any exists, is in the governors vetoing the bills and maintaining the status quo.

The reality, then is that while 11 states could break through the March 6 barrier, not all of them will. Missouri, New Jersey and Wisconsin are all pretty safe bets to move back at this point. We don't know enough about the situation in any of the four caucus states to say one way or the other what impact they will, collectively or individually, have on the shape of the final calendar. If Colorado Republicans are going to jump into February contingent upon whether the race has been decided by March, then they are a fairly safe bet to stay where they are. Unless one of the Republican candidates sweeps all of the early contests prior to March, the race for the nomination will still be going strong. Michigan will not hold a primary any earlier than the February 28 date currently called for by state law. If they move, it will be back. The Michigan Republican Party has provided the Republican-controlled legislature with guidelines for setting the date between February 28 and March 6. In other words, Michigan will go no earlier than where Arizona is already scheduled. That would not push the calendar any earlier.

All we are really talking about then is Florida and Georgia. Two states!?! That's your calendar chaos? FHQ would argue that that is not madness. Yes, it keeps the calendar uncertain up to and probably beyond October 1. Yes, it was just two states (Florida and Michigan) that most threatened the calendar in 2008. But what we are witnessing now is not chaos and here's why:

• To the Florida and Michigan point: Part of the problem with the 2012 situation is that people have a tough time not equating what is happening this cycle with the historic nature and course of the previous cycle. There is a tendency to say, "Here we go again" when looking at the development of the 2012 calendar. That is true to a point. But to FHQ's way of thinking, chaos requires at least some element of the unexpected. And while the Republican National Committee did make some changes to their delegate selection rules, they did nothing to prevent what happened in 2008 from happening again. This was completely expected, or should have been. That is different from what happened in 2008. There was no prior precedent of a state or states jumping the window and directly threatening Iowa and New Hampshire in the way that Florida and Michigan did in 2008. That was chaos. What is happening now is not. We know that the four earliest states will simply wait until the others have decided on dates and go earlier than that. To paraphrase Iowa Republican Party Chair Matt Strawn, we may not know the dates yet, but we know the order. The same argument could be made for 2008, but we didn't know -- but probably had a pretty good idea of -- what the Iowa/New Hampshire reaction would be and we didn't know further how the national parties would react to that. Given the 2008 example, then, we have a better idea about what will happen in 2012.
• To the point about calendar uncertainty: This builds on what I just described above. No, we don't know the exact dates, but we do have a pretty good idea of what the order will be. Cry all you would like about the uncertainty, but you know who isn't acting like it is all uncertain? The candidates and their campaigns. FHQ has talked to enough people to know that the campaigns are and have been operating under the assumption that this nomination process would officially kick off sometime in January; not February when the parties would like to see things start. The campaigns are doing what campaigns do: Taking the information they have and formulating a plan. They know the four states that are going first, have a pretty good idea of the next group of states and have an even better idea of when and what states are holding contests on and after March 6. If the campaigns aren't acting as if this is a madhouse process, then is it? FHQ says no.

This is not chaos. There is not, nor will there be increased, frontloading. As we pointed out in our primer at the end of July, there is a sequence to all of this and to this point, it has followed form. Arizona was the first piece of information we expected to get. Dependent upon the information, the next series of states would decide. And that is where we are now: waiting for this sequence to play out and it will for the most part over the next few weeks.

--
¹ There was also a "Let the frontloading begin" headline out there. I cannot begin to tell you how misleading, not to mention wrong, that is. There are two elements to the frontloading phenomenon: the front and the load. One is the actual movement forward. We have seen some of this in 2012, but not very much compared to a cycle like 2008. That is the front -- states moving froward. For 2012, most states, as FHQ has mentioned, have complied with the new national party rules and moved back. The other element of frontloading is the compression. This is the loading part. We simply are not seeing the same level of clustering at the beginning of the calendar in 2012 that we have witnessed in past cycles. There is a reason Newsweek ran an article about the potential diminished significance of "Super Tuesday" 2012: there are fewer states scheduled for the earliest allowed date to hold contests, March 6.

What is really in question here is that there are a handful of states challenging the window rule, the rule that exempts Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina, but forces all other states into a March-June window. The Floridas, Arizonas, Michigans and Georgias of the world are not forcing any frontloading. They are instead just keeping the final calendar in doubt; the beginning point of it in particular. That is not frontloading. That's something different because while it is pushing up the start of the calendar, it is not bringing along with it the compression of the early parts of calendars in the past. Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina actually have a good amount of January and February real estate to work with to avoid that -- depending on other states' moves -- if they so choose. And they likely will.

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Wisconsin Assembly Concurs with Senate on April Presidential Primary Bill

The Wisconsin state Assembly today passed SB 115 by a vote of 65-32 with Democrats making up all of the nay votes. Five Democrats joined the 60 member Republican majority and the lone independent in support of the Senate-passed bill to move the Badger state presidential primary from the third Tuesday in February to the first Tuesday in April. The Assembly concurrence on the Senate measure clears the way for legislation to be enrolled and sent to Governor Scott Walker (R) for his consideration.

That would move the Wisconsin primary to April 3 for the 2012 cycle, placing the contest on the same date as the primaries in Maryland and Washington, DC in the middle of the calendar.

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