Invisible Primary: Visible -- Thoughts on the invisible primary and links to the goings on of the moment as 2024 approaches...
First, over at FHQ Plus...
- Missouri's presidential primary comeback remains in limbo and Pennsylvania could be a primary calendar wildcard deep into 2023. All the details at FHQ Plus.
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In Invisible Primary: Visible today...
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FHQ is not going to make much of poll of potential Republican caucus-goers in Iowa eight months away from the lead off caucuses. But I will do that thing that I do as a reminder. Trump's 54 percent to 24 percent advantage over DeSantis in the poll would net him just more than half of the delegates available in the Hawkeye state in 2024. Trump hypothetically pulling more than half of the support of those caucusing would not trip a winner-take-all trigger in a state that is strictly proportional with no official qualifying threshold to win delegates.
But recall that under current Republican Party of Iowa rules, those delegates are only proportionally allocated during primary season. If there is only one name placed in nomination at the national convention in Milwaukee next year, then all of the delegates from Iowa will be bound to that candidate on the first ballot. That caveat makes the Iowa delegate allocation -- or the binding of those delegates, really -- akin to the National Popular Vote plan that would award a state's electoral college votes in the presidential election to the national winner rather than the state winner. But again, that is only if there is just one name placed in nomination for the roll call vote as has become the custom. If there is a break in that trend, and more than one candidate makes the ballot, then the proportional allocation from primary season would carry over to the roll call vote.
File that one away for later.
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There are very few candidates, of either party, in nonincumbent races who were near or north of 50% in the national primary polls this early on. Those included Republicans Bob Dole in 1996 and George W. Bush in 2000, and Democrats Al Gore in 2000 and Hillary Clinton in 2016. All of those candidates won their party’s nominations, and none of those races were particularly close.
The interesting extension of that is what an early prohibitive favorite for a nomination does to the resulting field of candidates. Bush, Clinton and Gore all avoided a great number of opponents, viable or otherwise. Dole may have held an early lead in 1995 but that Republican nomination race drew more than a few candidates into the competition who had the conventional characteristics of successful nominees even if they did not ultimately take off (Phil Gramm or Lamar Alexander, for example).
But as with many other things, Trump is unique. The former president's legal wranglings create just enough doubt about 2024 as to lure some folks that might otherwise pass on a run against an internally (intra-party) popular former president into the race. Just yesterday I drew a parallel between the size of the 2016 Democratic field and that of the emerging 2024 Republican field. And while there is some truth to that, it will likely not be a field that is quite as small as the 2016 Democratic group or without conventionally qualified competition. The 2024 Republican presidential nomination race is likely to feature a field of candidates that is smaller than the 2016 Republican race, but with more concentrated quality (a former vice president, a former governor/UN ambassador, a well-funded senator and a popular governor and rival from the same state as Trump) than existed on the list of 1996 Republican aspirants.
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Quick hits:
- In the travel primary, yes, Trump and DeSantis will both be in Iowa this weekend, but travel to the Hawkeye state is intensifying in frequency.
- Illinois is not the general election battleground that Wisconsin is, but it will be another example of a delegate-rich state positioned deeper in the primary calendar that Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is visiting in the coming days. [And bear in mind that the Prairie state is one of those where delegates are directly elected on the primary ballot. Winning there in the delegate game requires a particular brand of know-how, if not direct experience.]
- DeSantis is not the only prospective candidate visiting states beyond the early ones on the calendar. Former Vice President Mike Pence was in Ohio earlier this week. And what was late last month a presidential announcement to come "well before late June" is now just "before the month of June is out" for Pence. So June for an official announcement. [But Pence has been running for 2024 for some time.]
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On this date...
...in 1976, as a marker of how different the early cycles of the post-reform era were, contests remained competitive in both parties nomination races. President Gerald Ford and former California Governor Ronald Reagan split primaries in Nebraska and West Virginia. Reagan took the former, the only seriously contested primary of the day. On the Democratic side, former Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter narrowly won caucuses in Connecticut, but lost to Idaho Senator Frank Church in Nebraska and to favorite son, Senator Robert Byrd in West Virginia.
...in 2004, Massachusetts Senator John Kerry swept the primaries in Nebraska and West Virginia.
...in 2011, former Speaker Newt Gingrich officially joined the race for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination.
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