Monday, May 8, 2023

The Lessons of the 2016 Republican Presidential Nomination Process, Redux

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...
If you haven't checked out FHQ Plus yet, then what are you waiting for? Subscribe below for free and consider a paid subscription to support FHQ's work and unlock the full site.


In Invisible Primary: Visible today...
...
There are a couple of inter-related themes that FHQ has revisited in this space with respect to the 2024 invisible primary. One is attempting to assess where former President Trump is (in 2023) on a scale of Trump 2015 to Trump 2019. In other words, across an array of measures -- fundraising, endorsements, organization, etc. -- is the former president closer to where he was in 2015 as a first-time candidate or 2019, when he carried the advantages of incumbency and the Republican Party infrastructure behind him? 

The other theme focuses on lessons various actors involved in the Republican presidential nomination process have learned from and since the last competitive nomination cycle in 2016. One such lesson Team Trump has taken to heart is to not take the delegate selection portion of the process for granted. While they may have been out-hustled on that front in 2016, the Trump campaign of 2019-20 designed a set of rules at the national level and pushed for changes on the state level that would ward off challengers, yes, but maximize the number of delegates the president would win in the process on his way to claiming a second nomination as well. 

Fast forward four years and Trump no longer enjoys the trappings of the office of the presidency nor the direct backing of the Republican National Committee. But the lessons of 2016 have not been forgotten. Team Trump is using a network of connections forged during his time in the White House to potentially influence the state-level delegate selection rules for 2024 if not some of the future Republican delegates in 2024. Politico's Alex Isenstadt updated his March story with further details of Team Trump's outreach to state party leaders. And it is clear that, despite doubt about Trump's delegate rules acumen in opposing campaign networks, the former president is mindful of the shortcomings of the 2016 operation and tending to the relevant state-level players to avoid a repeat in 2024.

Isenstadt leads with the recent effort to woo Republicans from Louisiana. And that is an interesting test case. Yes, the Cruz campaign lapped Trump in delegate selection in the Pelican state after Trump won the primary there. But that was not unusual in 2016. The Cruz campaign was adept at exploiting the intricacies of the delegate rules to their advantage where available. However, the Trump reelection effort in 2019-20 cleaned up much of that. Louisiana Republicans, for example, greatly streamlined their process from 2016 for 2020. A later primary date in the 2020 cycle allowed the state party to use truly winner-take-all rules to allocate and bind all of the state's delegates to the winner of the primary. 

Now, there is a delegate rule story (or many more) in every state, but this Louisiana example is instructive. Team Trump likely wants the party to utilize rules that more closely resemble the 2020 rules with respect to allocation and binding rather than those of the 2016 plan. And they are doing that outreach not only to Louisiana Republicans but Republicans in state parties across the country. Importantly, according to Isestadt's reporting, all signs point toward the president not only having a head start in these efforts but that his campaign is the only one wooing state party actors at this time.

Together, all of this is important and worthy of continued tracking. Trump wants to maintain for 2024 as much of the baseline rules from 2020 as possible. 


...
Team Trump is not the only one working those who will make decisions on the rules that will govern the 2024 Republican presidential nomination process on the state level. Vivek Ramaswamy was in Michigan this past weekend and he made the case for Michigan Republicans to conduct a primary next year rather than caucuses. Yeah, the state party will need a waiver from the RNC no matter what they decide.


...
FHQ has raised Trump's standing with evangelicals in response to a number of stories that emphasize each side of a divide with his falling support among the group on one side to his continued good standing there on the other. Seth Masket has a good one that mostly falls into that latter category, casting Trump's relationship with white evangelicals as transactional and that, because Trump delivered for them during his time in the White House, he remains in good shape with that particular demographic. Good piece.


...
On this date...
...in 1984, former Vice President Walter Mondale won the Maryland and North Carolina primaries while Sen. Gary Hart's narrow victories in Indiana and Ohio kept his campaign alive for the 1984 Democratic presidential nomination.

...in 1987, Gary Hart dropped out of the 1988 Democratic presidential race (for the first time that cycle) after reports of an extramarital affair surfaced.

...in 2012, former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney was three for three against nominal competition in the Indiana, North Carolina and West Virginia primaries as he closed in on securing the delegates necessary to claim the Republican nomination.



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Sunday, May 7, 2023

Sunday Series: There's no budding feud between Iowa and New Hampshire, but the Democratic parties in each are approaching 2024 differently. Here is how.

Much happened this past week with respect to the maneuvering at the very front of the 2024 presidential primary calendar. Iowa Democrats finally revealed an initial draft of their 2024 delegate selection plan. In the General Assembly in the Hawkeye state, the Senate pushed through a bill intended to protect the first-in-the-nation caucuses that now heads to Governor Kim Reynolds (R). And the motivation, at least part of it anyway, for that bill was to further insulate the caucuses from triggering the first-in-the-nation law in fellow early state, New Hampshire. 

But in the rush to draw battle lines between the pair of traditionally early states -- battle lines that do not really exist in the first place -- many missed an important story developing in plain sight. In the face of new calendar rules for 2024 on the Democratic side, state Democratic parties in Iowa and New Hampshire are taking vastly different approaches to protecting their early calendar turf. 

In the Granite state, Democrats started off defiant in December when the new DNC calendar rules were unveiled, have stayed defiant and give every indication that they intend to see this through to the national convention next  summer if they have to. Much of that defiance has come directly from the state parties and elected officials in the Granite state of all partisan stripes. But it is also right there in the delegate selection plan New Hampshire Democrats released back in March:
The newly released draft DSP specifies no date, a break from the past protocol. Additionally, it says what New Hampshire Democrats have been saying for months: 
The “first determining step” of New Hampshire's delegate selection process will occur on a date to be determined by the New Hampshire Secretary of State in accordance with NH RSA 653:9, with a “Presidential Preference Primary.” The Republican Presidential Preference Primary will be held in conjunction with the Democratic Presidential Preference Primary.
And, in truth, Iowa Democrats have not been saying much different from what their brethren in the Granite state have been. In February, new Iowa Democratic Party Chair Rita Hart was quick to strike a similar tone to New Hampshire's above in the immediate aftermath of the full DNC vote to adopt the 2024 rules.
“Iowa does not have the luxury of conducting a state-run primary, nor are Iowa Republicans likely to support legislation that would establish one. Our state law requires us to hold precinct caucuses before the last Tuesday in February, and before any other contest.”
Of course, none of that is surprising. Folks from both Iowa and New Hampshire have uttered similar things in past cycles when the calendar positions of each have been threatened. The mantra is simple in both states (for better or worse): When in doubt, lean on the state laws that protect the caucuses in Iowa and the New Hampshire primary. But on the surface this past week, it looked like Iowa Democrats were now doing the same thing in their delegate selection plan that New Hampshire Democrats did in March in theirs. Which is to say, it looked like the party was planning to defy the national party rules. 

Headlines that made their way to the fore after the release of the plan seemed to reflect that: "Iowa Democrats plan to caucus same night as Republicans." But under the hood, in the weeds of the Iowa Democratic Party delegate selection plan, the state party was telling a different story. The caucuses will take place on the same night that Iowa Republicans caucus. And that is likely to be sometime in January 2024. However, those precinct caucuses, at least according to the plan, will have no direct effect on delegate allocation in the Iowa Democratic process. It is not, to use the DNC terminology, the first determining step, the part of the process where voters indicate presidential preference which, in turn, determines delegate allocation. That is the step the DNC is watching. That is the step that would draw penalties should it occur prior to March 5, 2024, the first Tuesday in March for this cycle. 

What the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee is concerned with is when that all-mail presidential preference vote concludes. It is that vote that will affect delegate allocation. Like the New Hampshire primary in the delegate selection plan in the Granite state, the date the preference vote is set to conclude was left unspecified. If the end of that vote-by-mail process coincides with the likely January caucuses, then it would be a problem. If the point at which the preference vote results are revealed falls later in the calendar, it may not (depending on where that is). 

The key here is that Iowa Democrats are more clearly than ever bifurcating the allocation and selection processes. Their plan does not roll everything into one "caucus" as has been the case in past cycles. The January caucuses will only advance the delegate selection process. That will not influence delegate allocation. Even if delegates aligned with, say, Marianne Williamson were to move to the county stage from the precinct caucuses and set themselves up to be selected to move on to the district and state convention stages, that would not mean that they would be eligible to fill any Biden-allocated slots (as determined by the preference vote). That is something that can occur in the Republican nomination process, but on the Democratic side, the candidates and their campaigns have the ability to approve the delegates that are pledged to them. It is a failsafe the Republican process does not have. 

Bifurcation, then, allows Iowa Democrats to have their cake and eat it too. They can continue to hold first-in-the-nation caucuses (as part of the selection process) that complies with state law but also comply with DNC rules by using a later vote-by-mail presidential preference vote as the first determining step in the allocation process. 

One could argue that there is a structural difference between Iowa and New Hampshire in this instance. The Iowa Democratic Party has more control over its party-run process than New Hampshire Democrats do with respect to a state-run presidential primary. And while that is true, it also obscures the fact that New Hampshire Democrats are not completely without discretion here. Granite state Democrats have chosen to live free or die with the state-run primary option as a means of protecting the first-in-the nation institution. 

But New Hampshire Democrats do have a choice. The state party has the same first amendment/free association rights as the state Democratic Party in Iowa. But they have chosen -- and folks, it makes sense for them to do so politically in New Hampshire -- to stick with the state-run primary rather than explore other options. That could be some party-run process or lobbying majority Republicans in the New Hampshire General Court to create a carve-out for either the Democratic Party or the party with an incumbent president running for reelection. As an example, there could be a state-run/state-funded option for Democrats aligned with town meeting day in March. 

But again, New Hampshire Democrats have chosen a different path in response to the new DNC calendar rules than Iowa Democrats have. And as FHQ has argued, New Hampshire Democrats may be vindicated in the end. They are banking on the fact that the national party will cave at the national convention and seat any New Hampshire Democratic delegates if the fight lasts that long. 

In the near term, however, Iowa Democrats are differently approaching the threat to the caucuses (or what they are continuing to call caucuses). Their plan, rather than coming out defiant buys the state party both time and flexibility. And both are useful as the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee moves into the job of reviewing and approving 2024 delegate selection plans. Continued New Hampshire defiance in that process coupled with the flexibility the Iowa Democratic Party plan provides them means that, should New Hampshire Democrats draw sanctions from the DNC, then Iowa Democrats are well-positioned to make the case that their vote-by-mail presidential preference vote should be a part of the early window. That part of the process may not be first -- the caucuses, after all, will be in the selection phase -- but the all-mail preference vote could make the cut. 

...if the DNC feels compelled to keep four or five [compliant] states in the window before Super Tuesday. South Carolina, Nevada and Michigan are already there. Could more states be added? Iowa and Delaware, where things have been quite quiet, could be poised to move into that area of the calendar. 

The bottom line here is that there is no budding feud between Iowa and New Hampshire. Yet, the in the face of threats, state Democratic parties in each are taking on the new challenge in markedly and notably different ways. That is a story that merits more attention than any attempt to manufacture some non-existent calendar drama between the two. 



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Saturday, May 6, 2023

[From FHQ Plus] A Curious Decision on the Georgia Presidential Primary

The following is a cross-posted excerpt from FHQ Plus, FHQ's new subscription service. Come check the rest out and consider a paid subscription to unlock the full site and support our work. 

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As mentioned earlier over at FHQ, it was reported by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution today that Raffensperger had made his decision and that March 12 was the choice for the date on which to schedule the Georgia presidential primary for 2024. That instantly makes the Peach state the biggest draw on a day that includes primaries in Mississippi and Washington and Republican caucuses in Hawaii.

But it is a curious selection. Most outlets are treating the news as a denial of the proposed elevation of Georgia in the Democratic National Committee (DNC) calendar rules for next year. And it is, but that misses the point. First of all, the proposed February 13 date for the Georgia primary was never workable without either breaking the Republican National Committee (RNC) timing rules or splitting up the Democratic and Republican primaries and holding them on different dates.

That was clear last December when the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee (DNCRBC) first adopted the calendar rules. And it was even clearer when the full DNC followed suit this past February and when Raffensperger’s office drew a red line because of the aforementioned conflicts.
But what makes this curious and also is being missed is that there was a middle ground in this case that was never really considered. And it is not clear why. As FHQ has noted in February, the secretary could have scheduled the Georgia primary for March 1 or 2 and the move would have met the criteria set by his office. The contest would shift into the early window on the Democratic calendar, albeit later than February 13, would not violate RNC rules and would keep the two parties’ primaries together.

The only catch was that the Georgia Republican Party may have wanted to retain its winner-take-all by congressional district method of delegate allocation. That would potentially have kept the primary in the second half of March. But by selecting March 12, Raffensperger took that discretion away from Georgia Republicans. The party will be stuck with some version of proportional rules for the 2024 cycle.

Without that hitch — without Peach state Republicans insisting on winner-take-most allocation methods — there was no difference between March 1 and March 12. The winner-take-all prohibition treats both dates, and all dates before March 15, the same. But those dates, March 1 or 2 and March 12, are separated by miles in terms of potential impact. A solitary primary before Super Tuesday stands to carry a lot more weight than a primary, especially a proportional primary on the same date as other contests, a week after Super Tuesday. The former is a guaranteed impact, an influence on the Super Tuesday contests. The latter is influenced by Super Tuesday and may — MAY (It would be a gamble.) — put a candidate over the top in the delegate count or be enough to winnow the remaining viable challengers.

That point, however, is moot now. The Georgia presidential primary will fall on March 12. But that does not make it any less strange a decision.


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Friday, May 5, 2023

Checking in on 2024 Republican Delegate Math

Thoughts on the invisible primary and links to the goings on of the moment as 2024 approaches...

First, over at FHQ Plus...
  • Extended thoughts on the new Georgia presidential primary date for 2024 and updates in Iowa caucus legislation and Nevada Democrats' draft delegate selection plan. All the details at FHQ Plus.
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In Invisible Primary: Visible today...
...
With Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) having now set the date of the presidential primary in the Peach state, one of the biggest remaining unknowns in finalizing delegate numbers for 2024 was resolved yesterday. Many gaps remain. 

There are still nine jurisdictions that do not have contest dates at all yet for Republican delegate selection to commence. However, outside of the uncertainty with the Missouri presidential primary (or likely caucuses), most are small states or territories. None have delegates in large enough numbers to fundamentally change the basic contours of the delegate terrain across the entire calendar. But there are states with official dates at the moment that may change dates and may have a greater impact on all of this. Pennsylvania comes to mind. Additionally, the states with gubernatorial and state legislative races this fall will also have some effect on the final delegate totals for each state. Republican control there affects at-large delegate totals. 

Although important, none of that is going to do much to change the basic delegate outlook other than at the margins. So what is missing is a denominator (the final overall total number of delegates) and the placement of nine-ish contests on the calendar. But again, that is only likely to alter things at the margins. 

What can be said now, with Georgia in place on the calendar, is that roughly half of the delegates will have been allocated in the Republican presidential nomination race by mid-March next year. Notably, the calendar will hit the 50 percent allocated mark right around the same time that the Republican prohibition on winner-take-all allocation ends on March 15. 

That suggests a few things. First, the Republican race will only be over by that point if all the viable candidates other than the delegate leader have dropped out of the race. It could happen. This is how candidate Joe Biden became the presumptive Democratic nominee in 2020. However, with winner-take-all states on the horizon in the Republican process, 2024 Republican candidates may have some incentive to stick around. That is particularly true since one of those truly winner-take-all contests, Florida, sits right there on the winner-take-all side of the proportionality window. And with two Floridians likely to contest the Republican nomination, that is not an insignificant primary. 

Second, the reality of this projected math may or may not have some influence on the remaining states left off the board at the moment. If decision makers in those states and territories are looking to stay ahead of an unknown point on the calendar where some candidate may clinch the nomination, then this halfway point may serve as a dividing line of sorts for them. Before that line, a state or territory contest may get lost in the shuffle of other primaries and caucuses in multiple and larger states, but after it, voters may have less or no say in who the nominee will be. 

Finally, the sweet spot in the 2024 presidential primary calendar is likely to be in the two week stretch between March 19 and April 2. The former is the point on the calendar when winner-take-all rules kick in with a flourish in Arizona, Florida, Illinois, Kansas and Ohio, and the latter bookends things with (likely) primaries in Connecticut, New York, Rhode Island and Wisconsin. A candidate may not secure the nomination in that span, but it is likely that a large enough delegate advantage will have been accrued by that juncture in the calendar to make the delegate math nearly insurmountable. The writing may be on the wall before then, but the math will likely catch up with it at this point. 

But again, that is just a rough estimate.


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FHQ started the week talking about state legislative endorsements and we will end the week on a similar note. Ron DeSantis (R) pulled in another notable backer in the endorsement primary yesterday when New Hampshire state House Majority Leader Jason Osborne (R) threw his support behind the Florida governor's nascent bid for the White House. Democrats dominate the New Hampshire delegation to Congress and the Republican governor in the Granite state is considering his own nomination run, so this passes as a pretty sizable get for Team DeSantis in the first-in-the-nation primary state. 


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Not to harp on the Georgia primary being scheduled, but here is one more thing that popped into my head about Raffensperger's decision yesterday. It did not used to be this way in the Peach state. It used to be that, like the vast majority of other states, the Georgia legislature made the decision on the setting of the presidential primary date. But the Georgia General Assembly has a quick session that ends in mid-spring that, in turn, made it hard for the state to 1) be adaptive and 2) place the primary in a position on the calendar that "matters."

That was the impetus behind the 2011 change to Georgia election law that ceded the authority to schedule the presidential primary to the secretary of state. It bought decision makers in the state some time to survey the landscape and choose a date that made Georgia a distinct player. Early on, after the change, that continued to mean a Super Tuesday primary. 

But Raffensperger's decision to schedule the 2024 presidential primary in the Peach state for March 12 comes at a time that is roughly in line with where the decision was made by the General Assembly and Governor Deal (R) back in 2011. There was no -- well, maybe limited -- surveying of the landscape, but instead, an early decision on the matter. And it may or may not have made a difference in terms of making Georgia a player in next year's races, but it certainly will quiet all the question about whether he would find common ground with Georgia and national Democrats hoping to bump up the date of the primary. 


...
On this date...
...in 1980, Colorado Democrats caucused.

...in 1984, former Vice President Walter Mondale won the Texas primary while Jesse Jackson scored an upset victory in Louisiana's primary.

...in 1992, President George H.W. Bush and Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton were both three for three in primaries in Indiana, North Carolina and Washington, DC. The wins for Bush secured the president enough delegates to claim the Republican nomination.

...in 2011, five Republicans -- Herman Cain, Gary Johnson, Ron Paul, Tim Pawlenty and Rick Santorum -- vying for the 2012 presidential nomination debated in a Fox News-hosted forum in Greenville, South Carolina. It was the first debate of the cycle. 

...in 2012, President Barack Obama won Democratic caucuses in Florida, Guam and Michigan. Note the caucuses. A cycle after state parties in Florida and Michigan defied national party rules on timing, both conducted caucuses to avoid the same fate in 2012 because the state-run primaries were still not compliant.

...in 2015, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee joined the field of candidates contesting the 2016 Republican presidential nomination. 



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Thursday, May 4, 2023

Raffensperger Zeros in on Date for Georgia's Presidential Primary

Thoughts on the invisible primary and links to the goings on of the moment as 2024 approaches...

First, over at FHQ Plus...
  • More on the delegate selection plan from Iowa Democrats (and an update on that caucus bill working its way through the state legislature there as the session winds down), a final update on Hawaii's presidential primary and Iowa's was not the only delegate selection plan to go live on Wednesday. All the details at FHQ Plus.
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In Invisible Primary: Visible today...
...
Georgia to March 12? Greg Bluestein and Mark Niesse at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution are reporting this morning that Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) is set to schedule the presidential primary in the Peach state on Thursday, May 4. And the choice is an interesting one. 
Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger plans to announce the decision on Thursday to establish Georgia’s primary date for March 12, according to several people with direct knowledge of the decision who aren’t authorized to speak publicly ahead of a press conference.
Georgia added some flexibility to the timing of its presidential primary back in the lead up to the 2012 nomination cycle. Instead of the state legislature handling those scheduling duties, the body ceded that authority to the secretary of state and empowered the office with rather broad latitude on the matter. Despite that discretion, the presidential primary in the Peach still ended up on Super Tuesday in both 2012 and 2016, consistent with where the primary had been stationed in every cycle dating back to 1992.

But Raffensperger broke with that pattern for the 2020 cycle, initially setting the date for the fourth Tuesday in March, three weeks later than had become usual. And the move was something of a nod to Georgia Republicans. The state Republican Party took the opportunity of the later date to increase the delegate prize for anyone victorious in the Republican presidential primary. Delegate allocation shifted from a more proportional method to one that was winner-take-all by congressional district. Georgia was another piece in the bigger puzzle that was President Trump's renomination race. As in other states across the country, Georgia's 2020 plan made it harder for other candidates to win any delegates and easier for Trump to win, if not all, then most of the delegates in the state. 

All of that is important context for the decision Secretary Raffensperger is apparently set to make. Moving to March 12 would not only impact the ill-fated plans of national and Georgia Democrats to move the primary to a pre-Super Tuesday position, but it would affect the delegate allocation scheme Georgia Republicans would be able to use. Any plan like the one used in 2020 would not comply with Republican National Committee rules. Winner-take-most methods like the one used by Georgia Republicans in the last cycle are prohibited by RNC rules before March 15. 

That means that Georgia Republicans will have to return to a more proportional method similar to the ones utilized by the party in either 2012 or 2016. It may take some folks a bit of time to get there on this, but some will likely eventually argue that this move by Raffensperger hurts Trump because it dilutes any potential net delegate advantage the former president may take out of the Peach state next March. But honestly, that conclusion is not exactly clear at this point in time. The difference between a winner-take-all by congressional district method and a proportional one that has a winner-take-all trigger (as Georgia's did in 2016) can be negligible. If Trump is in the position he is in now in polls when votes are cast next year in primaries and caucuses, then it is likely that he would take fairly significant net delegate gains from Georgia regardless of the methods mentioned above. 

That, however, hinges on what Georgia Republicans decide about delegate allocation rules in the coming months. It seems unlikely, but the state party could opt for a strictly proportional method that really could hurt Trump or at the very least potentially stunt any significant delegate gain from the Peach state. 

All this just triggers the usual mantra used around these parts: The rules matter. And this calendar decision of Raffensperger's moves the needle there. 

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Iowa Leftovers. I still do not feel like many folks have spent much time reading the Iowa Democratic Party draft delegate selection plan. Some of the reporting has been bad and some of the reactions have been worse.

From New Hampshire, Michael Graham at The New Hampshire Journal had this lede:
The Democratic National Committee may have killed the Iowa caucuses, but Hawkeye State Democrats aren’t going down without a fight. Their problem is that, even if they can somehow battle their way past the DNC, they’ve still got to contend with New Hampshire Secretary of State David Scanlan.
This is just wrong. 

The Iowa plan in no way signaled that Iowa is fighting anything. In fact, it indicated just the opposite. If anything, the Iowa plan was a deescalation in its back and forth with the Democratic National Committee. Yes, it laid out a delegate selection process that will start with the likely January precinct caucuses. But the allocation process, the important one based on the vote-by-mail preference vote, will not kick in until that preference vote is completed. The Iowa plan went to some lengths to separate those two processes so as not to run afoul of the DNC rules for the 2024 cycle. It stands to reason, then, that the preference vote will not be complete until some time that is compliant with DNC rules. 

Now, those mail ballots may be sent out to Iowa Democrats at some point in January, but that is no different from absentee ballots being mailed to voters or early voting starting before early contests like New Hampshire's primary conclude. Hey, Californians started voting as early as February 3 in 2020, the same day as Iowa's caucus (and before the New Hampshire primary!). But results were not reported until Super Tuesday, well after the early contests in 2020. And guess what! New Hampshire's primary law was not "triggered."

Sure, there is a new secretary of state in New Hampshire this cycle, but the dynamic is no different. New Hampshire's results will very likely be in and part of the fabric of the 2024 presidential nomination races before Iowa Democrats begin to report on the preference vote there. 

Graham really should have led with Secretary Scanlan's last line from the New Hampshire Journal story: “We’re just going to have to watch and see what they do.” Indeed. If the Iowa Democratic preference vote ultimately is scheduled to conclude before New Hampshire, then there may be a fight, but all this "fight" talk is wholly premature in light of the plan Iowa Democrats shared on Wednesday.

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And from Iowa, FHQ hates to disagree with our friend Tim Hagle, but I do disagree with elements of his reaction to the Iowa Democratic delegate selection plan here:
“It’s polite to say it’s in flux.” He [Hagle] added, “Nobody knows what’s going on at this point. ... The plan that the Democrats are putting through with a mail-in caucus, there won’t be that sort of that intensity where you’ve got to get people ready by caucus night. And so we’re probably not going to see a lot of candidates. It’s basically a disservice to Iowa voters.”
It is fact to say that the draft delegate selection plan is in flux. Plans from all 57 states and territories are at this point. But Iowa's plan made things a lot clearer about the path forward there. The disservice that the Iowa Democratic Party is doing is continuing to call the entire process a caucus. Yes, there is a brand there. But the plan offered by the party is no longer a caucus. The delegate selection process is through a caucus, but the allocation part of this -- the part that matters to everyone watching -- is going to be routed through a separate vote-by-mail preference vote. Folks, Iowa now has a party-run primary if some version of this basic plan is approved. That is what this is. Continuing to call it a caucus just confuses that reality. 


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Polls may be flashing warning signs at President Biden, but just as troubling, if not more so, is the fact that a major union, the United Autoworkers, is holding off on endorsing the president. That is a biggish story about the potential Democratic coalition in 2024. Granted, the polling and the UAW not endorsing at this time may just fit into a broader narrative that is in vogue at this juncture of the invisible primary: embattled Biden. It is something of a theme this week, what with there being a story about Biden's possible troubles with African American voters recently as well. 

Of course, all of this comes before the reelection campaign has kicked into full gear for the president, the sorts of activities meant to woo valuable constituencies back into the Democratic fold for the general election in 2024. Voters are just not engaged yet. As Karl Rove noted over at the Wall Street Journal just this morning, Barack Obama was not in the best of positions at this point in 2011 either. Let's get into (or at least closer to) 2024 and see what the fundamentals look like and then we can talk about warning signs. They may be there now, but odds are high that the UAW will endorse Biden in the end and African Americans will solidly back the president (Yes, the margins matter.).


...
On this date...
...in 1972, Alabama Governor George Wallace (D) won the first Tennessee presidential primary.

...in 1976, both Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan swept primaries in Alabama, Georgia and Indiana. Reagan's Indiana victory was his first primary win outside of the South. 

...in 2004, Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) won the Indiana primary on his way to the 2004 Democratic presidential nomination.


...in 2016, Ohio Governor John Kasich bowed out of the contest for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination.



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Wednesday, May 3, 2023

Iowa Democratic Draft Delegate Selection Plan Points Toward Changes Ahead

Thoughts on the invisible primary and links to the goings on of the moment as 2024 approaches...

First, over at FHQ Plus...
  • Today is deadline day for state parties to submit draft delegate selection plans to the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee. An update on where that process stands. Also, the Hawaii bid to establish a presidential primary appears to have taken another hit. All the details at FHQ Plus.
If you haven't checked out FHQ Plus yet, then what are you waiting for? Subscribe below for free and consider a paid subscription to support FHQ's work and unlock the full site.


In Invisible Primary: Visible today...
...
Iowa Democrats (IDP) got a draft in just under the wire. As noted above, it is deadline day for draft delegate selection plans to be submitted to the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee and the 2024 draft plan is now publicly available from Hawkeye state Democrats. Importantly, IDP indicates that it will conduct caucuses on the same day as Iowa Republicans next year. That fact, alongside the caucus bill that is working its way through the state legislature, would appear to indicate that Democrats in Iowa are prepared to defy DNC rules.

But as FHQ noted yesterday, there seems to be a fundamental misreading of that legislation and how it interacts with the proposed plans for Democratic delegate selection in the state in 2024. Here is the operative section from the draft plan on the proposed scheduling of the delegate selection process in Iowa:
The Iowa Caucuses shall consist of an expression of presidential preference, conducted by mail, AND in-person precinct caucuses. The precinct caucuses will be held in accordance with Iowa Code (ICO 43.4) at least eight days prior to any other state’s presidential nominating contest, on the same date as the Republican Caucuses. The purpose of the precinct caucuses will be to elect unbound delegates to county conventions, elect precinct committee persons, and move platform resolutions to the county convention. No expression of presidential preference will be tabulated at the precinct caucuses. The period for expression of presidential preference by mail will begin and end on dates included in the Iowa Democratic Party Chair’s call to caucus, which shall be issued no later than 90 days prior to the Caucuses.
So what does that suggest? A few things:
  1. The caucuses will coincide with the Republican delegate selection process. That is still likely to be in January 2024.
  2. Note that there is no mention of any "first determining step," the language the DNC uses for when votes are cast to determine delegate allocation.
  3. In fact, that section goes to great lengths to bifurcate the delegate selection and allocation processes. Unbound delegates will be chosen at the likely January precinct caucuses. [Binding is Republican Party language, but FHQ digresses.] No attempt is being made at the precinct caucuses to select delegates pledged to any particular presidential candidate. [There will not, at least under this draft plan, be any slating of delegates before the preference vote.]
  4. The allocation process will be based on the vote-by-mail presidential preference vote, the dates of which are unspecified, and left to remain that way until a caucus call is issued by the Iowa Democratic Party no later than roughly three months before the caucuses (late summer/early fall 2023). That is a tell of sorts. On some level, that issuance of a call rider to the section above allows Iowa Democrats to kick the can down the road a bit on this matter and continue to potentially lobby the DNCRBC for a spot in the early window (should some other previously selected early state fail to comply). And barring that, it simply buys the state party time to figure all of this out (on its own or in conjunction with the DNCRBC).
  5. Look, Iowa Democrats may call this a caucus, but it is not. More than ever before the 2024 plan resembles the Democratic delegate selection/allocation process in most other states. There is, on the one hand, a process, usually a state-run primary, for voters to express presidential preference. The allocation is based on that. And on the other, there is a caucus process designed to actually select the human beings/delegates who will fill those allocated slots. The preference vote Iowa Democrats describe above is a primary. It is a party-run primary by any other name, and allocation will be based on that. Delegate selection will continue to run through the caucus process. Only now, that will potentially begin before the preference vote. That, in and of itself, is not necessarily unusual. 
Now, flashback to that caucus bill in the legislature. Folks, it got amended before being passed by the state House earlier this week. And the new provisions fit well with the bifurcated process Iowa Democrats detail in their draft delegate selection plan. Many raced to the conclusion that the in-person caucusing component doomed Iowa Democrats' plan. It does not. What the amended bill does do is the same thing that the draft delegate selection plan does: it makes a point to separate out the allocation and selection processes. And that is a big change in Iowa.

In the meantime, recall that this is a draft plan. It will go before the DNCRBC for review and together both sides will hammer out something that works under the new DNC guidelines for 2024. 

...or Iowa Democrats will face penalties. But the plan above makes it more likely that Iowa Democrats will be able to comply.


...
Senator Tim Scott (R-SC) looks like he will make a splash in the staff primary by hiring the first woman of color to run a Republican presidential nomination campaign. Jennifer DeCasper may not register as a seasoned hand at the presidential campaign level -- there is no defection here, for instance -- but her hiring carries a certain symbolism to it. 


...
I don't know, but it seems like maybe Politico is late to this story. Those who have been reading Invisible Primary: Visible this year will know that Trump 2023 is closer to Trump 2019 than Trump 2015 by most measures. And part of that is campaign discipline, something endorsements have continued to show. 


...
On this date...
...in 1976, former Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter won the Democratic caucuses in Colorado. 

...in 1980, the Texas primary saw frontrunners win on both sides; former California Governor Ronald Reagan on the Republican side and President Carter in the Democratic contest. But that was back when Texas Democrats were using the Texas Two-Step system with delegates allocated in caucuses the same day as the primary.

...in 1988, Vice President Bush swept Republican primaries in Indiana, Ohio and Washington, DC while Jesse Jackson's win in the nation's capital kept Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis from winning all three contests in the Democratic nomination race. 

...in 2003, Democrats held their first presidential primary debate of the 2004 cycle. In a mark of how different the era was as compared to now, of the nine debate participants, only three -- Dick Gephardt, Bob Graham and Al Sharpton had officially launched formal presidential campaigns. The remaining candidates had merely formed exploratory committees to that point in the race before formal announcements later in 2003.

...in 2007, Republican candidates for the 2008 presidential nomination debated for the first time at the Reagan Library in California in a forum hosted by MSNBC. 

...in 2008, Illinois Senator won the Democratic caucuses in Guam (by seven votes).

...in 2015, Ben Carson announced his bid for the 2016 Republican nomination.




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Tuesday, May 2, 2023

Invisible Primary: Visible -- Did Glenn Youngkin Run for 2024?

Thoughts on the invisible primary and links to the goings on of the moment as 2024 approaches...

First, over at FHQ Plus...
  • That caucus bill in Iowa got tweaked, but it probably does not offer the fixes Democrats in the Hawkeye state want. The Missouri presidential primary drama could go to overtime. FHQ was wrong about the territories. Is there finally momentum for a primary move in Pennsylvania? All the details at FHQ Plus.
If you haven't checked out FHQ Plus yet, then what are you waiting for? Subscribe below for free and consider a paid subscription to support FHQ's work and unlock the full site.


...
Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin (R) seemed to pass on a 2024 presidential bid in response to a question on Monday, May 1. 
Wall Street Journal editor-at-large Gerard Baker asked Youngkin on Monday at a “Governing America” conversation with the Milken Institute: “Are you going to be dusting off that fleece jacket and getting out on the presidential campaign trail later this year? 
“No ... I’m going to be working in Virginia this year,” Youngkin said.
This is not exactly news. Youngkin has stated numerous times that his focus is on Virginia and the state legislative elections in the Old Dominion later this year. The new element yesterday was the no. Yes, some are picking up on that "this year" that was appended to the no, but that makes this more of a Sherman-ish rather than Shermanesque statement. It may provide an out next year, but the cold, hard truth of the matter is that if Youngkin is not entering the race this year, then he is not going to get in next year (or is unlikely to do so successfully anyway). Things can certainly change between now and then. However, it is perhaps fantastical (at this time) that Trump would collapse and all the other challengers to him for the Republican nomination would fall flat, opening the door to a white knight to come to the rescue. Again, that is fantasy, but a fantasy that is entertained by some every four years when the US goes through the exercise that is the presidential nomination process. There may be something of a repeat of 2012's discover-scrutiny-decline phenomenon in the 2024 Republican presidential nomination race, as Seth Masket notes, but getting a discovery surge to take off in 2024 during the primaries is just a tall order. 

"This year" effectively means "I'm not running."

Yet, the fact that Youngkin is out(-ish) does raise a question. Did the Virginia governor run for 2024? That is a tough question to answer. Clearly, Youngkin traveled, but it was not to, shall we say, calendar-specific locales like DeSantis or Pompeo or Haley have done. Nor did he, as the governor noted in his response to Baker at Milken, put out a book as DeSantis and Pompeo have done. However, the travel that he did do -- to New York, to Texas etc. -- was often to meet with big donors. Clearly there was some testing of the waters -- on both sides -- in those meetings. It was enough that those same donors questioned whether or not Youngkin was even into the idea of running at all. 

Did Youngkin run? Again, that is tough to discern. He did some things that prospective presidential candidates do, but fell well short of what some of those who have entered or look to be entering the 2024 race have done. And that is a good example of the conceptual squishiness of the notion of running for 2024 but not running in 2024. Where does one draw the line? Are interactions between a possible candidate and donors enough? Because outside of that, all that is really out there is some constant chatter about a Republican who won an off-year gubernatorial election in a blue state making a reasonable presidential candidate and folks asking said Republican about whether he is running or not. 

Youngkin is simply not a clear case.

UPDATE: Apparently Team Youngkin is trying to push the door back open on 2024. But yeah, see above.


...
Okay. Here is another line from that Richmond Times-Dispatch story on Youngkin:
As for wiggle room, Youngkin said he would not embark on a presidential campaign “this year.” But the Republican Iowa caucuses are Feb. 5, 2024.
Nope. The Republican Iowa caucuses are still not scheduled for February 5, 2024. They never have been. If anything, Youngkin has even less "wiggle room." The caucuses are likely to be in early to mid-January next year. 

...
Speaking of early primaries, there is no date for the Georgia presidential primary. It will not be on February 13 as the Democratic National Committee may want, but Greg Bluestein at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution looks at the options Secretary Brad Raffensperger (R) has before him in terms of where he may schedule the primary for next year. 

Georgia can hold a single primary for both parties as early as March 1 under RNC rules. Any earlier than that and Republicans in the Peach state would be vulnerable to the RNC super penalty for timing violations. That would knock the Georgia delegation to the Milwaukee convention down to just twelve delegates. 

Democrats' efforts to push the primary up to the February 13 position prescribed in the new DNC rules are likely to be futile given those penalties. And now that Michigan has passed legislation to move into its February 27 spot -- not to mention that the DNC has now also adopted its rules -- flipping Georgia and Michigan in the order seems out of the question. 

However, if the DNC is serious about nudging the Georgia primary into the pre-window and it does not mind a Michigan-and-then-Georgia pairing to close the pre-window, then perhaps the Georgia primary could fit into the space between the Michigan primary on February 27 and Super Tuesday on March 5.

Saturday, March 2 would work.


...
On this date...
...in 1972, Sen. Scoop Jackson (D-WA) withdrew from the race for the 1972 Democratic presidential nomination on the same day as primaries in Alabama, Indiana, Ohio and Washington, DC. Jackson won just once, in his home state of Washington.

...in 2000, Bush and Gore swept through late season primaries in Indiana, North Carolina and Washington, DC.

...in 2012, Newt Gingrich suspended his campaign for the Republican presidential nomination.

...in 2019, Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet (D) announced his bid for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination. 

...in 2020, Kansas Democrats concluded their party-run presidential primary.



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Monday, May 1, 2023

Invisible Primary: Visible -- New Hampshirites Are Not Surprisingly Defending the New Hampshire Primary

Thoughts on the invisible primary and links to the goings on of the moment as 2024 approaches...

First, over at FHQ Plus...
If you haven't checked out FHQ Plus yet, then what are you waiting for? Subscribe below for free and consider a paid subscription to support FHQ's work and unlock the full site.


...
President Biden announced his reelection bid last week and that has set off an inevitable chain reaction, one that focuses on the president's path to renomination and possible reelection. And the renomination portion leads to the calendar decisions the Democratic National Committee has made for the 2024 cycle. There, the emphasis has once again returned to the potential, if not obstacle, then headache the demotion of the New Hampshire Democratic presidential primary in the calendar order will have on Biden in both phases of the 2024 electoral process win the Granite state. 

Understandably, that has once again brought the defenders of the first-in-the-nation primary in the Granite state back out to "warn" the president (and anyone else) about the mistake Biden is making in not only shunting New Hampshire back in the process, but in possibly keeping his name off the ballot in a likely rogue primary there. Senator Jeanne Shaheen (D) took to the airwaves on Sunday in the midst of the renewed chatter about the DNC-New Hampshire standoff over the primary to discuss the possible negative impacts the president's decisions may have:
“It’s unfortunate, because I think it has an impact [on] the independent voters who are very important in New Hampshire, and who are going to be very important to any reelection of the next president,” Shaheen said. “And it also has an impact on Democrats up and down the ticket.” 
...
“The fact that we would now discount their [independents'] participation, I think, is unfortunate,” said Shaheen, who is not up for reelection until 2026. “And again, I think it has implications for Democrats in the state — hopefully not for the general election, but we don’t know that yet.”
Independent voters are important in New Hampshire politics. They offer a bit of an unknown in the presidential primary process there as well because registered independents can pick which of the Democratic or Republican primaries they want to participate in. And while the calendar decisions may impact independents in New Hampshire, they are unlikely to be any more or less affected by it -- or activated by it -- than Democrats or Republicans in the Granite state in 2024. All New Hampshirites, regardless of any registration affiliation, are likely to be upset to some degree about the change, but that is less likely to impact the primary than the general election.  

The reason for that has been made clear over the years. Independents tend to go where the action is in the New Hampshire presidential primary. And in 2024, the action will be on the Republican side. Look at 2012. President Barack Obama won around 49,000 votes in winning the New Hampshire primary as an incumbent. That was roughly 80 percent of the vote the 2012 primary. By comparison, John Edwards won around the same number of votes in the 2008 New Hampshire primary, but that was only worth a third place finish at about 16 percent of the vote. That was part of a significant (but typical) drop off in turnout from a 2008 to 2012 when an incumbent president was running largely unopposed. Turnout was back up in 2016 when the Democratic nomination was again active. 

The pattern holds on the Republican side. From competitive 2016 to uncompetitive 2020, Republican turnout dropped by a total approaching 50 percent. 

So, there may be some independents who show up to cast a vote of protest in the likely rogue Democratic primary in New Hampshire next January, but most will be far more likely to venture over into the Republican process instead. And that is a different, albeit not completely unrelated, story from how New Hampshire voters may behave in a general election. But even Shaheen concedes she does not know the impact there. 

None of this is out of the ordinary. New Hampshirites have often turned to blackmail over the years when the first-in-the-nation primary has been threatened. And it has been threatened anew for 2024 and in a different way than it has in the post-reform era. However, independents may be further down the list of blackmail items that can be used, successfully or otherwise, as the standoff with the national party continues. The simple truth of the matter is that New Hampshire was narrowly decided in 2020 and any small change could tip the balance the other way in 2024. That was just as much the case before the calendar decisions were made as it is now that New Hampshire Democrats are scrambling for a way out of the impasse.


...
Of course, Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) has been running for 2024 for quite some time because he has been doing the sorts of things that prospective and actual candidates for the White House do for quite some time. That was true before last month when South Carolina's junior senator announced his exploratory committee for the presidency and it will continue to be the case as his major announcement on May 22 approaches: 
“It is time to take the Faith in America tour not just on the road, not just to an exploratory committee,” the South Carolina Republican told the crowd of about 150 people, a comment which received a standing ovation. “It is time to make a final step. We are going to have a major announcement. You are going to want to be there.”
This can be said about Scott thus far: He has done a good job teasing out these various announcements to keep his name in the news.


...
Vivek Ramaswamy picked up some South Carolina endorsements during his bus tour of the Palmetto state last week, including a pair of state legislators from the Low Country. FITSNews is the only outlet reporting that, but one of the state representatives, Matt Leber, seems to have indirectly confirmed the endorsement by retweeting the story. No, that is hardly a groundswell of support, but the thing worth eyeing here is that Ramaswamy continues to basically build a White House run from scratch. It will be a campaign that builds more from the bottom up rather than the top down as, say, Trump is doing in the endorsement primary. Ramaswamy may or may not catch on in 2023-24, but his is a grassroots build out and state legislative and local endorsements are part of that, a valuable part. He takes the bus tour to New Hampshire this week, where Ramaswamy already counts one fairly big state legislative endorsement from the deputy majority leader of the state house, Fred Doucette.


...
Harry Enten at CNN picked up on a parallel point to one FHQ made last week. But instead of focusing on the different ways in which similar polling numbers for Biden and Trump can be read differently, he turned toward the similar positioning of Ron DeSantis and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. And similar though the poll positions of the two may be, how those numbers are being interpreted for both is very different. Good piece from Harry.


...
On this date...
...in 1976, former Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter and former California Governor Ronald Reagan (R) won big in the Texas primary. Louisiana Democrats caucused as well.

...in 1979, George H.W. Bush announced his bid for the 1980 Republican presidential nomination.

...in 1984, former Vice President Walter Mondale (D) won the Tennessee presidential primary while Jesse Jackson took the primary in the nation's capital.



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