Utah Republican Party Moving Closer to 2016 Caucuses

This flew under FHQ's radar in the recent flurry of legislative action on presidential primary laws across the nation.

The Utah Republican Party voted unanimously in an emergency meeting on Wednesday, February 18 in favor of a resolution to hold caucuses next year in the presidential nomination race in lieu of continuing with the state-funded primary. The move is yet more fallout from the continued flap over the nomination process for most offices in Utah that has pitted the Utah Republican Party against the state legislature/government.

FHQ has touched on this divide some already, but Robert Gehrke at the Salt Lake Tribune sums up the battle lines quite nicely here:

Under the SB54 compromise struck last session, candidates can go through a party's convention and try to win the nomination by gaining support from delegates chosen at neighborhood caucuses. Alternatively, they can gather a requisite number of signatures from eligible voters to secure a spot on the primary ballot.

It is that latter option that the Utah Republican Party has objected to and has ultimately dragged the party's 2016 delegate selection process for president into the fray. The Executive Committee of the party passed the resolution to make the switch from primary to caucuses at the February meeting, but the Utah Republican Party Central Committee has to actually make the changes to the state party bylaws bring the switch to fruition. The group is set to meet on Saturday, March 7 to address the matter.

The impending Saturday meeting has prompted reaction from Mitt Romney, the Republican standard bearer in the 2012 presidential election. In a letter to party and government officials, Romney made the case for a primary over a caucuses/convention system, urging the letter's audience to get behind legislation currently before the state legislature to move the primary election back into compliance with the national party delegate selection rules. Of course, regardless of how the state government moves on that March primary bill, the state party will have the final say in how its delegates to the national convention are chosen. Right now, it appears that the Utah Republican Party is moving toward caucuses, but the big guns have been brought out to urge the party to reconsider.

--
NOTE: Saturday may be an interesting day for the primary calendar. Utah Republicans will not be alone in looking to switch from a primary to caucuses. Kentucky Republicans will be considering a similar change at a meeting of their own on March 7.

Recent Posts:
March Presidential Primary Bill Divides Democrats But Passes Washington State Senate

Washington State House Bill Would Cancel 2016 Presidential Primary

Idaho Senate Passes March Presidential Primary Bill

Are you following FHQ on Twitter, Google+ and Facebook? Click on the links to join in.

March Presidential Primary Bill Divides Democrats But Passes Washington State Senate

Half of the 24 member Democratic caucus in the Washington state Senate joined unified majority Republicans in the upper chamber to pass SB 5978 on Tuesday, March 3. The bill would move the presidential primary in the Evergreen state from May to the second Tuesday in March.

The AP has an account of the vote here. FHQ would counter AP reporter Derrick Nunnally's assessment that the bill is intended to strengthen the presidential primary. The better way of describing the rationale behind the Washington secretary of state-backed move is one of enticement.

The reason Democrats in the state Senate were divided over SB 5978 was that the state Democratic Party has traditionally had little to do with the presidential primary election since its first run in the 1992 presidential election cycle. In fact, Washington Democrats have had less than little to do with the primary. They have used a caucuses/convention system to select and allocate delegates in each of the six cycles that the Washington presidential primary has existed.

Secretary of State Kim Wyman (R) and legislative Republicans appear to be unified in support of the earlier primary, but are trying to coax Democrats -- or enough Democrats -- to go along with them.

Part of the package of enticements is the earlier primary. A second Tuesday in March primary would hypothetically be early enough to provide voters in the state of Washington with a voice in the presidential nomination process. But the last primary in 2008 was in the middle of February. Both parties held caucuses a week and a half before that primary. Both national parties allowed February contests in 2008, but a February primary that year did not prove to be enough to bring Democrats into the process.

Mostly that was because the primary, though early, was essentially open to voters outside of the Democratic Party (because there is no party registration in Washington). And the Washington Democratic Party has preferred closed caucuses in which only Democrats were affecting the selection and allocation of delegates. To deal with that issue, SB 5978 also includes a provision that -- provided both state parties opt into the primary and decide to allocate at least some of their national convention delegates based on the results -- would require voters to declare which party's primary in which they intend to vote.

Is that enough to get Democrats in the legislature on board with the idea? Half of the Democratic caucus in the state Senate was open to the idea, but the state party seems to be leaning toward maintaining the caucuses system. The now-Senate-passed SB 5978 now moves to the Democratic-controlled state House for consideration. There is an identical bill already in the committee stage in the lower chamber, but there is now also a bill there to cancel the 2016 presidential primary altogether. The 2012 Washington primary was also canceled.

All this sets up an interesting possible impasse. If the Republican Senate prefers the March primary legislation and the Democratic House ends up pushing the primary cancelation, the default is the May primary that is already in the statutes. The state legislature may be unwilling to expend the $11.5 million on a May primary likely to be after the point at which both national parties have settled on nominees in 2016. The end game would appear to be that that eventuality -- the above hypothetical impasse -- would push the parties toward earlier caucuses dates, making the multimillion dollar expenditure much less likely.

All eyes will now be on the state House now. The early primary proposals and the possible cancelation of the primary are all on their doorstep now.

Recent Posts:
Washington State House Bill Would Cancel 2016 Presidential Primary

Idaho Senate Passes March Presidential Primary Bill

From Mississippi, One SEC Primary Bill Dead, Another Survives Deadline

Are you following FHQ on Twitter, Google+ and Facebook? Click on the links to join in.

Washington State House Bill Would Cancel 2016 Presidential Primary

Late last week on Friday, February 27, Washington state Representative Sam Hunt (D-22nd, Olympia) introduced HB 2185. The bill, offered based on a request from the Washington Office of Financial Management, calls for the cancelation of the 2016 presidential primary in the Evergreen state.

In light of the fact that Washington Secretary of State Kim Wyman (R) requested bills (in both the House and Senate) to move the presidential primary up from May to March, this is an interesting development. That is made all the more curious because one of the co-sponsors of the March primary bill in the House is Rep. Hunt, the main sponsor of this new legislation to cancel that primary election.

The Washington legislature passed legislation in 2011 to cancel the 2012 presidential primary. That bill was later signed into law and was estimated to have saved the state $10 million. Given the request from the Office of Financial Management, it would appear that similar potential savings are behind this move also. That Washington Democrats have never really used the primary to allocate delegates in the past and Republicans have had an on-again-off-again relationship with the primary would factor into any decision to cancel the primary as well. Democrats control the state House, but Republicans control the state Senate. This may move in the state House, then, but potentially find resistance on the Senate side.

--

UPDATE (3/3/15): Senate bill passes

Recent Posts:
Idaho Senate Passes March Presidential Primary Bill

From Mississippi, One SEC Primary Bill Dead, Another Survives Deadline

Florida Senate Committee Reports March 15 Presidential Primary Bill Favorably

Are you following FHQ on Twitter, Google+ and Facebook? Click on the links to join in.

Idaho Senate Passes March Presidential Primary Bill

Idaho got one step closer to bringing back a presidential primary on Tuesday, March 3. By a 23-11 vote, the Idaho state Senate passed SB 1066.¹ The measure would reestablish a presidential primary election in the Gem state, but schedule it to coincide with second Tuesday in March school elections instead the May position it has been consolidated on with other primaries for state and local offices.

Democrats in Idaho have traditionally selected and allocated delegates to the national convention through a caucuses/convention system, but when Idaho Republicans followed suit -- abandoning the May primary for March caucuses for the 2012 cycle -- the Republican-controlled legislature eliminated the May presidential primary.

The bill to revive the presidential primary now moves to the state House, where at least one representative and member of the Idaho Republican State Central Committee, Ronald Nate (R-34th, Rexburg), has already spoken out against the move.² How widespread that opposition is in the House remains to be seen. The Idaho Republican Party recently passed a resolution to support a shift back to the primary from caucuses if the legislature is able to pass a bill.

--
¹ Five Republicans joined all six minority party Democrats in opposition to the bill.

² Rep. Nate had the following to say on SB 1066 in the Senate hearing (via Betsy Z. Russell at the Idaho Spokesman-Review):

Rep. Ron Nate, R-Rexburg, said he was speaking not as a state representative but as a Republican Party official, a current Idaho GOP central committee member and the past rules committee chairman. “Nominating presidential candidates is a party function,” Nate told the Senate State Affairs Committee. “The Idaho taxpayer should not be forced to pay for Democratic, Republican or other party’s nominations. … With current budget priorities like education and transportation in question in Idaho, we should not be spending another nickel and certainly not another $2 million to help political parties do their work.” 

Nate said the Idaho GOP in January approved an absentee voting process for its presidential selection caucuses that he said would address concerns about some members, from military members to the elderly, not being able to participate.

Similar arguments were made on the floor of the state Senate when the bill was being debated.

Rep. Nate was also the chair of the 2012 Idaho Republican Caucuses and helped draft the rules that governed them.

Recent Posts:
From Mississippi, One SEC Primary Bill Dead, Another Survives Deadline

Florida Senate Committee Reports March 15 Presidential Primary Bill Favorably

Amended Senate Bill Would Push Maryland Presidential Primary Back Further into April

Are you following FHQ on Twitter, Google+ and Facebook? Click on the links to join in.

From Mississippi, One SEC Primary Bill Dead, Another Survives Deadline

Tuesday, March 3 marked the day in the Mississippi state legislature that bills passed in one chamber had to have made it through committee in the opposite chamber. Neither of the bills -- one from the House and one from the Senate -- affecting the date of the presidential primary in the Magnolia state had cleared that hurdle heading into Tuesday.

Once the dust had settled on the day, the state Senate-passed version of the bill (SB 2531) was reported favorably from the House Apportionment and Elections Committee while the House-passed version (HB 933) failed to navigate the Senate Rules Committee.

This was not an oversight. Recall that both bills started off in the same place -- with identical language -- but an amended version of the Senate bill passed the Senate and headed to the House.  The bill introduced in the House, however, pushed through the committee phase and consideration on the floor without amendment.

The state Senate, then, would have been motivated to support its amended version and not the unamended one the House passed and sent the upper chamber.

That is one interpretation of the move. But this likely is not a story of inter-chamber dispute. Rather, the Mississippi legislature only has to pass one of these bills. It could wrangle over two different bills or it could drop one and negotiated over the particulars of the other. Given the events of yesterday, it is clear legislators opted to take the latter path.

The House Apportionment and Elections Committee made some minor changes to SB 2531 and recommended that the bill "do pass" on the House floor. But if the bill passes the House it will have to return to the Senate for the upper chamber's approval of the changes made by the House committee (and floor if there are amendments made there).

The bottom line, though, is that the process to move the Mississippi presidential primary up a week on the presidential primary calendar -- to the proposed SEC primary slot -- moved forward Tuesday.

--
UPDATE (3/11/15): Amended Senate bill passes state House

Recent Posts:
Florida Senate Committee Reports March 15 Presidential Primary Bill Favorably

Amended Senate Bill Would Push Maryland Presidential Primary Back Further into April

Oklahoma Senate Passes Bill to Move Presidential Primary Back Three Weeks

Are you following FHQ on Twitter, Google+ and Facebook? Click on the links to join in.

Florida Senate Committee Reports March 15 Presidential Primary Bill Favorably

The Florida state Senate Committee on Ethics and Elections conducted a hearing on SB 7036 this afternoon (Tuesday, March 3). The legislation would create a "static and permanent" date for the Florida presidential primary on March 15.

There was some discussion about the bill, but it was not extensive. Mainly, Florida Democrats on the committee questioned how the bill would affect the Democratic primary process in the Sunshine state. The provisions in the bill do not affect the Democratic Party any differently. The primary date would be on March 15.

--
The one thing that did come up that FHQ would push back on is that this bill is intended to allow Florida Republicans to maintain winner-take-all rules. It was argued that current law calls for a March 1 primary which would prevent the Republican Party of Florida from allocating its delegates in a winner-take-all fashion.

This is not true. And FHQ is probably to blame. If not for this post -- based on a misreading of the RNC rules described in the Editor's Note here -- legislators in the Sunshine state would likely not have come to this conclusion. I know. That sounds big-headed of me, but they got the March 1 date interpretation from the FHQ 2016 presidential primary calendar (see footnote 5 here).

And it is wrong. I was wrong.

There is nothing that prevents Florida Republicans from having a winner-take-all primary under the current law. The law, as it stands now, moves the Florida presidential primary to the earliest date that would avoid penalties. If Florida Republicans did not have some version of winner-take-all rules in their delegate allocation plan, then that earliest, non-penalized point on the calendar would be March 1. But since it appears as if winner-take-all is going nowhere, that earliest, non-penalized date is March 15.

There is no need for Florida legislators to change the law. It would call for a March 15 primary date regardless. The one benefit to the change is clarity. A "static and permanent" date does that.

--
The bill -- identical to the House committee-passed bill -- now moves on to consideration on the Senate floor.

Recent Posts:
Amended Senate Bill Would Push Maryland Presidential Primary Back Further into April

Oklahoma Senate Passes Bill to Move Presidential Primary Back Three Weeks

Bill to Move Illinois Presidential Primary from March to July Introduced

Are you following FHQ on Twitter, Google+ and Facebook? Click on the links to join in.

Amended Senate Bill Would Push Maryland Presidential Primary Back Further into April

SB 204 passed a procedural hurdle on Tuesday, March 3 in the Maryland state Senate, but not before the bill an amendment was offered and agreed to on the floor by its author and sponsor, Sen. Joan Carter Conway (D-43rd, Baltimore City).

In its amended form, SB 204 would shift the presidential primary in Maryland from the first Tuesday in April to the fourth Tuesday in April. Previous versions pushed the election back just one week to the second Tuesday in April.

The reason for the initial change was to prevent an overlap between weekend early voting and the Easter holiday. Furthermore, the final canvass and certification of the results after the election would avoid a conflict with the Passover holiday. However, the new fourth Tuesday in April date called for in the amended bill falls right in the middle of the Passover week in 2016; on April 26.

The one benefit of the fourth Tuesday in April date is that it coincides with a number of other primaries in nearby states; notably Pennsylvania and Delaware, but Connecticut and Rhode Island as well. Maryland has been a part of subregional primaries during the last two cycles. It was paired with the primary in Washington, DC in 2012 and combined with both DC and Virginia for the Potomac Primary in 2008.

--
UPDATE (3/5/15): Bill passes state Senate
UPDATE (3/15/15): House bill clears committee

Recent Posts:
Oklahoma Senate Passes Bill to Move Presidential Primary Back Three Weeks

Bill to Move Illinois Presidential Primary from March to July Introduced

The Slippery Slope in North Carolina Rogue Primary Coverage

Are you following FHQ on Twitter, Google+ and Facebook? Click on the links to join in.

Oklahoma Senate Passes Bill to Move Presidential Primary Back Three Weeks

By a vote of 39-2, the Oklahoma state Senate passed SB 233 on Tuesday, March 3. The measure would shift the presidential primary in the Sooner state from the first Tuesday in March to the fourth Tuesday in March.

In 2016, that would mean moving out of the proposed SEC primary slot on March 1 and to March 22. That spot on the calendar is currently occupied by only Arizona. Utah legislation would make that date an option in the Beehive state if passed as well.

The legislation now moves on to the Oklahoma state House.

--
Thanks to Richard Winger at Ballot Access News for passing news of the bill's passage on to FHQ.

Recent Posts:
Bill to Move Illinois Presidential Primary from March to July Introduced

The Slippery Slope in North Carolina Rogue Primary Coverage

March 15 Presidential Primary Bill Sails Through Florida House Committee

Are you following FHQ on Twitter, Google+ and Facebook? Click on the links to join in.

Bill to Move Illinois Presidential Primary from March to July Introduced

A second bill to shift back the date of the Illinois consolidated primary has been introduced in the state House. Instead of moving it back to June like the other bill, though, HB 3107 would push the Illinois primary -- including the presidential primary -- back to the third Tuesday in July.

Now, obviously the bill from Rep. Steve Andersson (R-65th, Geneva) is problematic. If this bill were to pass the legislature and be signed into law, the Illinois presidential primary would fall (July 19) on the same week that the Republican National Convention will be going on in Cleveland. Choosing delegates in an election on a date during the week of the convention those delegates are to attend is not all that logistically feasible. The conflict would run into the same difficulties as the August Montana primary proposal FHQ discussed last week. In the case of Illinois, however, the delegates actually appear on the primary ballot and are chosen in that manner rather than selected in caucuses and bound by primary results. That is a unique wrinkle in Illinois that would make implementing a change to a July primary even more difficult.

The June primary idea has been floated in the Illinois legislature previously and went nowhere. And as FHQ detailed in the Montana primary discussion last week, proposals calling for a presidential primary during or after a national convention has already occurred have been brought forth in the past, but none of them have successfully navigated through a legislature, much less been signed into law.

Recent Posts:
The Slippery Slope in North Carolina Rogue Primary Coverage

March 15 Presidential Primary Bill Sails Through Florida House Committee

County Elections Officials in Arkansas Mostly Supportive of SEC Primary Move

Are you following FHQ on Twitter, Google+ and Facebook? Click on the links to join in.

The Slippery Slope in North Carolina Rogue Primary Coverage

There is one narrative that seems to be emerging in the coverage of the North Carolina presidential primary drama that is not necessarily true to the spirit of the legislative wrangling that brought the Tar Heel state into the crosshairs of the national parties. It goes something like this:

"Two years ago lawmakers decided to make the primary earlier - on the first Tuesday after South Carolina's, next February. State GOP Chairman Claude Pope now wants the primary moved to March 1st. He says the national Republican Party is threatening to take away delegates from North Carolina for the earlier primary."

Now, FHQ does not want to pick on WUNC's Jeff Tiberii. His piece is a short blog post -- and he is certainly not alone in this -- but it is representative of the direction some of the other media coverage on the North Carolina presidential primary situation is going. The implication is that decision-makers in North Carolina just cannot make up their minds. They were for an early presidential primary before they were against it.

Yes, legislators in Raleigh passed HB 589 in the summer of 2013. And yes, it moved the presidential primary out of May, tethering it to the likely February South Carolina primary. But decision-makers in North Carolina have not suddenly in 2015 found religion and awakened to the possibility of sanctions from the Republican National Committee.

Those penalties -- the so-called super penalty -- were in place coming out of the 2012 Republican National Convention in Tampa. And though the penalty was tweaked between that time and the summer of 2014 when the RNC finalized its delegate rules for 2016, how North Carolina would have been affected by the penalty -- assuming a rogue primary date -- never changed. Additionally, Rep. David Lewis (R-53rd, Harnett) was in the state House and was North Carolina Republicans' national committeeman representative on the RNC.¹

Overall, though, this North Carolina dilemma is less a story of legislative indecision than it is a story of legislative process. The 2013 omnibus elections bill -- HB 589 -- originated in the North Carolina House. The version that passed the state House did not contain any language affecting the positioning of the North Carolina presidential primary. It was not until the bill got to the state Senate that the presidential primary provision was added.

There are two other important elements to this that help set the context in 2013. First, the bill was controversial and ladened with changes to the way elections would subsequently be conducted in North Carolina. Provisions cutting back on the number of days of early voting and requiring a photo ID were the big ticket items and received exponentially more scrutiny. The presidential primary portion of the lengthy bill was at best an afterthought. In combination with that was the timing of all of this. The state Senate committee substitute to the House-passed bill hit the floor of the Senate for consideration with the clock running out on the 2013 legislative session. Republicans in control of the legislature wanted to pass something and send some elections changes to the new-in-2013 Republican governor's desk to be signed into law.

Here is a situation, then, where you have a throwaway primary provision in a bill that is being considered in an environment in which legislators are rushing to pass something, anything to change up the elections system in North Carolina.

The state Senate passed the bill after 5PM on the final day of the session. The bill then went to the House, which had to either concur with the Senate changes -- including the presidential primary provision -- or tweak those changes and send the bill back to the Senate. Again, the House got this bill after 5PM on the last day of the session. To concur meant to go home. Amending the Senate changes, however, meant prolonging the process even further.

That was the decision the representatives in the state House faced. Agree and go home or change and keep at it into the night. They chose the former, passing the bill along party lines and calling it a session.

Again, this isn't a story about indecision. If anything this further extends the battle lines that are drawn between the North Carolina House and Senate. The state Senate added the primary provision in 2013 and is defending it now. Members in the House may or may not have wanted to go along with that at the time. Those in the House and the North Carolina Republican Party may regret that decision now, but that is not part of some flip-flop they have done on the scheduling of the North Carolina presidential primary.

--
¹ How well known those RNC penalties were to legislators at the time of the bill's passage is an unknown in all of this. In the immediate aftermath of the bill being signed into law, some North Carolina senators were already defiant.

Recent Posts:
March 15 Presidential Primary Bill Sails Through Florida House Committee

County Elections Officials in Arkansas Mostly Supportive of SEC Primary Move

Is the Florida Republican Presidential Primary Winner-Take-All?

Are you following FHQ on Twitter, Google+ and Facebook? Click on the links to join in.