Democrats Weigh Whether Iowa Should Stay 1st In Line For 2024 Election

[RandySF]

While it's only 2021, a major question facing Democrats this year and next will be what to do about the presidential nominating calendar and whether Iowa, in particular, should retain its prized place at the front of the calendar in 2024.

Iowa's decades-long lock on the nominating process has been under threat since last year's disastrous caucus, when results were delayed for days due in part to a faulty smartphone app that was supposed to make things easier for precinct captains when they reported results. Ultimately, The Associated Press never declared a winner in the contest because of problems with the vote count, which was administered by the Iowa Democratic Party.

Iowa's voters are also older, more rural and more white than many other states so it's seen as increasingly out of step with the Democratic mainstream, which increasingly relies on voters of color and young people for its support.

President Biden's newly-installed pick to lead the Democratic National Committee, Jaime Harrison of South Carolina, will get a chance to shake up the calendar by appointing members to the party's rules and bylaws committee. Unlike past presidents, Biden didn't win in Iowa (he came in fourth, after former South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg and Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren) and owes no political debt to the complex caucus process.

"I think on its merits that the Iowa caucus falls short of the values that we espouse as Democrats," Julian Castro said. Castro served as housing and urban development secretary under President Barack Obama and ran for president himself in 2020.





https://www.npr.org/2021/01/23/959209520/democrats-weigh-whether-iowa-should-stay-first-in-line-for-2024-election

[servermsh]

1. Both Iowa and NH need to be removed from the start

[empedocles]

2. Should be easy decision

[msfiddlestix]

5. yeppers.

[Blue_true]

11. I believe that South Carolina, Georgia or North Carolina should lead off

our party’s nominating contest. Those states have the diversity makeup that reflects where our party is at. California and Texas should stay where they were in 2020, followed the week after by states like Michigan - that sequence was particularly decisive in giving us who I was sure of at that time was our best possible nominee.

[PAMod]

49. Agreed.

I also wouldn’t mind rotating the start of the primary season.

[Blue_true]

75. Rotation would work. But very big states should never lead off the cycle.

Sorry California, Texas, Florida, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, if you lead off our nominating process, you will distort the result and we are likely to end up with the wrong nominee, better to keep you at key deciding points where you confirm that the right choice has been made, or adjust things so that later states pick the right nominee.

[PAMod]

77. Excellent point.

[LonePirate]

3. Iowa needs to be given the boot. Move it to the middle of the pack or even last.

The state is far too white and far too rural to be anything close to demographically representative of the Democratic Party nowadays.

[Sogo]

6. ...and yet,

Iowa gave us Jimmy Carter, Barack Obama, Bernie Sanders in a virtual tie with Hillary, and Mayor Pete, all the more progressive choices of their times....

[Turin_C3PO]

13. It's not about whether

Iowan Dems choose a centrist or progressive. It’s the fact that Iowa Dems are largely white and rural whereas the party as a whole is more urban and ethnically diverse.

[Sogo]

23. My point is that rural and white can can and does

make the same kinds of choices that urban and more diverse makes. Which is not to say that I don’t think that the order shouldn’t be changed up. Just pointing out that the white and rural argument doesn’t really hold up....

[dsc]

34. actually that is untrue

The fact is other than Obama and maybe Carter, Iowa has been divorced entirely from the candidates minority voters have chosen.

[Demsrule86]

29. And consider Joe Biden lost both Iowa and New Hampshire. It was a miracle that he managed to

pull it out...he won the election. Had we nominated a different candidate, I believe we would have lost. The problem is New Hampshire and Iowa can't be counted on to nominate candidates who can win going forward.

Clinton also lost both Iowa and New Hampshire...and he saved us from another four years of GOP presidents...which would have been 16 years.

[dsc]

35. He didn't really lose Iowa

since he, and everyone who wasn't Harken didn't contest it.

[Demsrule86]

42. Well the papers of the day said he lost it so it was considered a loss...

Iowa is not a good predictor of elections success.

[msfiddlestix]

4. I thought the obvious answer to this question was already settled

in last year's primary. I mean we've been sorting this for years, last year's nailed it as a big fat NO. Huge waste of campaign money and time to make Iowa first in line. Absolutely NOT.

[BlueStater]

7. It should have been done away with decades ago.

Why does this moderately populated, mostly white state always get the first say as to who the nominee is for both parties? It’s utter bullshit.

[msongs]

8. red states go last. maybe GA and AZ should go first now nt

[Demsrule86]

12. Nope...we have to consider the Black vote. Mississippi for example is a majority Black state now...

if properly supported it will turn blue. We need a new voter rights bill...every state must be considered a possibility ....50 state strategy.

[Turin_C3PO]

16. Mississippi

and South Carolina both stick out to me as red states that could turn blue due to their high black population.

[Demsrule86]

20. I agree...blue wall states, North Carolina, South Carolina, Arizona, Nevada,Virginia

Georgia, Texas etc...should all be early.

[Retrograde]

21. You've got to get people to the polls

And I somehow don't think Mississippi or South Carolina make that easy. We need a multi-pronged approach: get people registered, get them out on voting day, and get them to off-year elections so Democrats can make inroads into state legislatures and reform voting laws.

[Demsrule86]

31. That is why we need a new federal bill...which takes on gerrymandering and election rights.

[Demsrule86]

32. Agree.

[Blue_true]

14. I agree. Put states that better reflect the diversity of our party first.

I still remember that hauling video of a Iowa caucus participant, who when told that she had voted for Pete Buttigieg, who was Gay, asked “can I have the vote back and vote for someone else”, that isn’t where we are or should ever be.

[xmas74]

9. I think it should be in groups of five states each,

Maybe starting in mid January and running every two weeks. All primaries and caucuses would be done in May.

It's still time for campaigning but it isn't the months long focus on a few states.

And yes, Iowa can be the first caucus in the nation still. Hell, NH can technically be the first primary if they open early enough. They'd both go on the same day, with NH starting early in the day along with three other primary states and Iowa caucuses that evening. Iowa can even start their caucus before the polls officially close in the other states, if needed.

[xmas74]

28. Or it can become something similar to a drawing.

Randomly draw for the order of the first group of five,second, etc. It might bring some excitement to state parties knowing their primary/caucus date can change so some states are never left towards the end or forgotten.

[Demsrule86]

44. We don't want random. We want to consider what order of states will help us pick the best candidate

for national elections.

[Demsrule86]

10. I think both need to go. No more caucuses.

[JI7]

15. Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada , and South Carolina should all go first

on the same day. And no more caucuses .

[Demsrule86]

18. Iowa should not be first...too much power in a small state...the same with New Hampshire.

[JI7]

25. All 4 can go on the same day

[Demsrule86]

45. There is not reason for Iowa or New Hampshire to go first.

[RandySF]

17. My proposal

The first five states should be Ca, Ga, Pa Wi and Az. in any given order.

[Demsrule86]

19. I don't think CA should go first.

[JI7]

26. Nope, I'm in California which means lots of money would be needed

and would mostly favor wealthy.

[Laelth]

22. This is significant.

It appears that Iowa is lost to us. Like Ohio, Iowa has become Indiana. I see no reason for us to continue to kick off our primaries in Iowa.

Instead, I would vote for South Carolina. African-American women chose Joe Biden as our nominee, and he won.



-Laelth

[Demsrule86]

46. That is a very good point.

[Laelth]

51. It's just the truth. n/t

-Laelth

[nsd]

24. In 2020, Iowa and NH had basically no say in the result.

Joe Biden won because of SC.

Maybe a bigger state would be better, but to win the general election, we need a candidate who is plausible for states like Iowa and NH. A candidate who can only win CA and NY will lose.

[Retrograde]

27. Do them in batches of 5-10

between March and June. Pull the states at random for the order in which they can hold their primaries - no caucuses. And consider ranked-choice voting in the primaries.

The quality of recent Republican presidents is a good argument for bringing back the smoke-filled rooms, where candidates were actually chosen at the conventions. True, we probably wouldn't have gotten Obama, but we almost certainly wouldn't have gotten Trump.

[Celerity]

30. Iowa needs to go, it was only 3,104 flipped D to R votes (in IA-3) away from being 100% Rethug at

both state (in terms of the trifecta) and federal levels.

Axne (IA-3) is the ONLY Dem left (and will be in trouble in 2022), the Rethugs control the Governorship, the State House, the State Senate, 3 of the 4 US House slots, and both the US Senate seats. Pig castrator dim bulb Ernst and Trump won it in a canter.

It is becoming the next Indiana and Missouri, white nationalist rural radical racist reactionary fundie xian Rethug dominated. Once it goes (if it does), I fear Wisconsin is next for the white nationalist machine, with only the A-A voting bloc in Milwaukee (historically very hard to turn out for us too) presenting any true systemic hurdle.

[Crunchy Frog]

39. WTF happened to Iowa? Obama won it twice.

Did everyone there just get radicalized? I'm not sure this pattern bodes well for the country's future.

[Celerity]

65. fear-driven RW white nationalist consolidation

I have a long time friend from an online game who is from Iowa (north of Cedar Rapids). We have talked extensively since I was 14 and met her online (in fall 2010). She is a bleeding-edge (born in the first two weeks of 1981, so barely made the beginning of the gen) Millennial. White, single mum (her oldest child is is only 2 years younger than me, she was a teen mum), not a racist (or wasn't, see below), was pretty liberal, voted for Obama in 2012, but then, come 2016 she started to change. She is overtly so paranoid about immigration (especially the undocumented who have come to work in the Iowa ag industry) plus her oldest sister got her to start going to a fundie church that is straight up RW. and was a true accelerant in her political changing

She has become very pro-life now (she has tremendous guilt from an abortion she had, that was a big tool her sister used to drag her into that fundie church), and no longer is in favour of LGBTQ rights (which has caused HUGE issues with our friendship, as I am a married lesbian). She has voted straight Rethug since 2016. She is always talking about how she doesn't want her children to grow up in an America that has 'left them behind', and how Democrats do not care about rural white folk. I am extremely good at debate, but she simply is beyond reaching at this point (although, a wee positive, she was not a Q-Anon whacko), as she says that the nation is going to change so much that her way of life, her 'culture' is going to be shattered beyond reclamation. She has a degree in history from Iowa State uni, so is not uneducated (which was part of the reason we kept talking for what is now over ten years.)

She also was married (now divorced) to a farmer, and fails to see the irony of her stances on farmers, as even though divorced, she still whinges about not enough aid is given to farmers (which is bollocks), and she rants on about Democrats giving away (and bankrupting the nation, lol) the national treasure to 'lazy' people. She lives in IA-1, and she is thrilled the Rethugs flipped the seat in 2020 (Abby Finkenauer lost by 2 and half percent), as I logged on 2 weeks ago to wish her happy 40th birthday and we talked a bit about the election, etc. She thinks that Trump was robbed (she said that it is too easy for 'certain people' (hello code word, and I went bonkers when she said that as I am racially mixed as well) in big cities to vote), but at least she condemned the Capitol insurrectionists. She is VERY rural/urban divide driven, she hates big cities with a burning passion. I have talked to her for countless hours over the years, so know her very, very well. She is the only Iowan I can say I know well, other than a bloke I knew in London from uni there, and I never spoke to him outside of school-related things.

Multiply her by 50,000, 100,000 or more, and I think you have a partial (obviously not precise) template for a beginning of an explanation for IA and the Midwest in general.

[Turin_C3PO]

40. I'm not sure

that Wisconsin or even Iowa will become more right wing. If we can get things done these next couple of years with progressive legislation that helps everyone, we might turn some voters back to our party. There's also a good chance that a chunk of Trump voters will crawl back under their rock and return to being the non-voting morons they always were before Trump was on the ballot.

[KentuckyWoman]

33. Georgia ....

[Politicub]

83. it would take more resources to campaign in Georgia for the primary than Iowa. Even so,

Georgia has a more diverse population than Iowa and would be a better barometer.

The population of Iowa is around three million people, and Georgia has a little more than ten million.

As a resident of Atlanta, I shudder at the thought of so many primary campaign commercials, though.

[dsc]

36. I think Maryland would be best with VA a decent second choice

MD is the smallest of the states with big cities so it should be the cheapest to campaign in of those states.

[Turin_C3PO]

41. I think Maryland

and NM would be good choices to be the first two states.

[Dawson Leery]

37. CA/TX/FL/NY/IL are the largest states

They should go first for once.

[Turin_C3PO]

43. The media markets

in those states are too big and expensive and would favor heavily the candidates with the most money.

[Demsrule86]

48. No, you have to field and candidate because of the electoral college that can win in other states.

And we are unlikely to do this with those states first.

[Retrograde]

76. Unfortunately true

unless by a miracle we get rid of the electoral college we have to keep pandering to the geographic middle of the country - Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois, Ohio, Iowa and the like.

[Demsrule86]

78. I agree it is unfortunate. I think many don't vote in red or blue states because their vote doesn't

matter. I wish we could get rid of the EC...but I don't see how this would happen.

[Renew Deal]

54. It's a money problem.

Doing that would eliminate less known candidates. That's still an issue in 2020. I think it's possible to put states on a rotation. Ultimately, it's a state decision when to go.

I know people complain about IA, but they seem to have the patience to learn about candidates. It's impossible to cover NY, CA, or TX the way IA and NH are covered.

[gulliver]

38. Do them all at once if we're serious.

Otherwise it's not fair. Any states that go before others "count more" than those that come later. We don't have candidates riding around on trains any more. We have jets, advertising, computer-aided GOTV. Just get the whole thing over with in one day and save our money and energy for the general.

[dsc]

47. then we will never have a candidate who isn't either very well known

or able raise vast amounts of money before running a Presidential campaign ever again. As it is, a lack of ability to fundraise cost us several candidates this time around (it basically killed off both Inslee and Montana's governor and certainly didn't help Harris, Hickenlooper or Bennett). I certainly agree Iowa for sure needs to go. NH could be OK as long as it is paired with a way more diverse state but replacing it with a nationwide primary would be a huge mistake.

[Demsrule86]

50. Biden had no money. He couldn't even run adds for super Tuesday and yet I believe he was the only

candidate who could have beaten Trump.

[dsc]

52. He would fall into the well known camp

literally no other candidate on our side could have survived his inability to raise money early on coupled with his horrible showings in IA and NH. And frankly he probably would have lost a nationwide primary if it had been held before he won SC.

[Demsrule86]

67. And Trump would have been reelected.

Primary's only exist to field a viable candidate for the election. That is their only pupose.

[gulliver]

60. I see that problem, but I think it's Ok

The days of becoming well known during the course of the primaries are over, imo. It may have made sense when we didn't have the Internet, and people couldn't get their message out largely for free. If a candidate is not at least somewhat bankable by primary season (at least a few percentage points in polls), I don't think they should be running. Certainly the shouldn't be able to "win an early state" and knock out someone who's bankable.

[Demsrule86]

68. A candidate that will win big in California would likely lose PA,WI and MI...states we need.

[Renew Deal]

55. There is a potential brokered convention problem if they all go at once.

Because almost every candidate would hang around.

[gulliver]

62. That's where I think we should use ranked choice voting (instant run-off).

That's much more democratic and fair, imo, and much more sensible. It keeps candidates with similar views from dividing their votes and allowing candidates with far less democratic consensus (far less fairly representative support) on their side an advantage.

[Demsrule86]

69. I hate ranked choice.

[GulfCoast66]

53. I think the state's legislature has to agree.

But in my mind the battleground states should be first. GA, SC, PN, AZ, maybe Florida although we are an expensive state.

But not sure the DNC can do this.

[Renew Deal]

56. And realistically, both parties have to agree.

Otherwise, it gets costly for the state to run double elections. The alternative is caucuses, but most would argue that's worse.

[JonLP24]

61. I'm just not sure why we constantly have to change things

Obama did well in Caucuses in 2008 and no one really complained.

I prefer candidates do they best they can with the system we have and the candidate with the most votes or delegates should win.

[Renew Deal]

64. No one complained about Obama or no one complained about caucuses?

I remember a lot of complaints about both, but especially the caucuses, which were widespread in 2008. The funny thing about 2008 is the candidate with the most delegates, not votes won.

[JonLP24]

66. I do remember complaints about Obama

I remember Obama was compared to McGovern.

Slate

Some pundits adorned Obama with the largest and most putrid albatross corpse that can be hung around the neck of a Democratic candidate: comparison to George McGovern, the liberal antiwar candidate who lost a 1972 landslide to Richard Nixon. In April 2008, a CNN correspondent named William Schneider asserted Obama was vulnerable to being portrayed as a “left-wing ideologue” because he was leading a “movement”-style campaign in the same manner as “Barry Goldwater in 1964” and “George McGovern in 1972.” Those campaigns, Schneider said, “failed because they were divisive.” (Goldwater, a Republican, lost by a wide margin to Lyndon Johnson.) CNN’s David Gergen predicted that “John McCain is going to go after Barack Obama as the George McGovern of 1972.” And after the Pennsylvania primary, the New Republic’s John Judis wrote an entire piece about Obama called “The Next McGovern?” in which he warned that the candidate was depending too much on “very liberal” voters, “college students,” and “minorities,” writing that Obama was demonstrating concerning signs that he was “going to have trouble winning that large swath of states from Pennsylvania through Missouri in which a Democrat must do well to gain the presidency.”

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/12/barack-obama-campaign-electability-risky-progressive-unelectable.html

I'm not sure if Wiki is accurate here but I trust it compared to all the misinformation out there but it says Obama won the popular vote and delegate count.

Popular vote
Obama: 17,535,458[1][a] Clinton: 17,493,836[1][a]
Percentage
Obama: 48.1% Clinton: 48.0%[1]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Democratic_Party_presidential_primaries

[Demsrule86]

70. Caucuses have to go. They are unDemocratic and only a minority of the states voters are able to

participate. I think we need a more diverse state than Iowa to be first as the Black vote is very important. We almost had a candidate win who would have had about 30 % of the overall vote who did not do well with Black voters. It would have been a disaster for us. Trump would have won.

[JonLP24]

73. We can't run experiments to determine who else would have won or lost

Sanders did well in the early states but the other candidates dropped out and coalesced around Biden and there is nothing wrong with that. Sanders also did well with the Hispanic vote especially if you look at Nevada exit polls who are key in general elections.

I'm not interested in refighting the last primary elections. I just want to move on and work together. Having a state in the midwest, northeast, southwest, and southeast as our first 4 states is fair.

[Demsrule86]

79. Sanders came damn close to winning with somewhere around 30% of the vote had all the

Democrats stayed in...we would have had a brokered convention and in the end lost the election in my opinion...the first three states must change and all caucuses must go consider how few voters participate in Iowa or Nevada...It is undemocratic. And can be manipulated in ways that cause candidates who can't win the election to be chosen as the nominee.

[JonLP24]

81. It seems those trying to change the primary

Are trying to design it in a way in which they think what kind of candidate will win.

I see comments about diverse states but Nevada & California are diverse states where Bernie Sanders got 50% of the Hispanic vote in both states. You can argue California is more progressive than most states but South Carolina is more conservative than most states.

The reason Biden did awful in the first couple states is because he ran a bad campaign early on. It nearly got to the point where he almost ended his campaign. Also those that favored moderate candidates were also not high on Biden either. Klobuchar & Buttigieg were heavily promoted in early states(these 2 candidates had a smaller chance of winning South Carolina than Sanders). After Biden's distant 2nd place in Nevada & win in South Carolina it was clear Biden had the best chance to defeat Sanders so most of the candidates rallied behind Biden.

The Sanders campaign also had some self-inflicted wounds that cost himself from winning the nomination.

https://statuscoup.com/inside-bernie-2020-how-the-revolutionary-became-his-own-worst-enemy/

[JT45242]

57. I live in iowa move us to the middle

I have lived in iowa, pa, and ohio.

Iowa is consistently more Republican than not.


Overly white overly rural, and has few electoral votes.

For over 30 years they keep sending Grassley to the Senate.

Go to the back of the line.

Ohio and pa actually matter for the presidential election. Iowa and it's 6 electors that Dems rarely get don't matter.

If you have less than 8 electoral votes or usually vote Republican go to the back of the line.

[tritsofme]

58. For starters, we should eliminate caucuses as a method of choosing delegates.

They are deeply undemocratic and unfair, it is far past time that they be relegated to history. Each voter should be guaranteed a secret ballot election.

Also especially given Iowa’s recent right turn, it doesn’t really make any sense for them to go first. They can have their primary on some Super Tuesday.

[JonLP24]

59. I would just keep it in Iowa

The app malfunctioning wasn't the State of Iowa fault.

They have a lot of access to the candidates and I trust Iowa Democratic primary voters to make an informed choice..

[Demsrule86]

71. It is not fair to Iowans. Few are able to participate. It is too complicated and takes to long. A

primary would allow more people to participate. No one should have a caucus.

[Tarc]

63. Iowa can stay #1...IF and only IF they scrap the godawful caucus system

It's 2021, go to the goddammned ballot box and simply drop your choice again.

Stop voting in Jimi B’s Bar and Grill over finger sandwiches.

[Demsrule86]

72. They are the worst state to be number one. And they should get rid of the caucus.

[Bettie]

74. If they move Iowa

will people stop hating the Democrats who live here? Or will it still be Iowa Dems suck 365 days a year?

[Demsrule86]

80. I don't hate any Democrat...but caucuses allow few to participate and are unDemocratic in my

opinion. Maybe many years ago...people could spend the time required to participate in caucuses but that time has passed.

[Politicub]

82. If they changed from a caucus to a voting primary state, then it would be more like reality.

Or, even better... the primary should be moved to a state that has a better swing-state profile.