Biden Camp Looking to Lower Expectations on Iowa and New Hampshire

[bigtree]

Last edited Tue Sep 3, 2019, 03:47 PM - Edit history (1)

Jennifer Epstein @jeneps 19m
Biden campaign says Iowa is really, really, really important but isn't a must-win. Same official also hedged on New Hampshire, noting that candidates from neighboring states (Warren and Sanders) traditionally do well there.

A top Biden campaign official said the former vice president may not win the Iowa caucus, and the race likely will remain competitive far beyond the first four primaries and caucuses. The official and two others briefed reporters on the condition of anonymity.

The official’s comment, effectively hedging for a potential loss in the first-in-the-nation nominating contest, is at odds with Biden’s repeated message to voters and interviewers in Iowa that the state holds “the key to the kingdom.”

The official also sought to lower expectations in the next state on the calendar, New Hampshire, saying it has traditionally favored candidates from neighboring states. Senator Elizabeth Warren is from Massachusetts and Senator Bernie Sanders is from Vermont. The official said polls in early primary and caucus states -- where Biden largely leads -- are likely to get tighter as more voters tune into the race in the coming months.

The race is likely to become a battle between three or four candidates, the official said. At the very least, a second official said, the former vice president’s campaign sees Biden, Sanders and Warren as likely to stay in the race well past Super Tuesday at the beginning of March.

read: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-09-03/biden-s-campaign-says-iowa-caucus-isn-t-a-must-win

...amazing admission for the 'electability' candidate.

[qazplm135]

1. I mean I will say this

I don't think it's wrong to say Biden CAN win even if he loses the first two states.

But it certainly dents his inevitability aura if that happens, and there may be a feedback loop there that is not favorable to him.

[DownriverDem]

6. Biden

is our best candidate. He knows how it goes in both the White House and the Senate. If he runs with a strong, progressive, Dem woman, they will be a formidable ticket. I wish folks would see it as I do. It's a numbers game and that's how it's played.

[Funtatlaguy]

2. I see 6 people coming out of Iowa

Then 1 drops out after NH.
Nevada stays status quo.
1 more drops after S.C.

That leaves 4 that survive for Super Tuesday in March.
The common wisdom says those 4 will be Biden, Warren, Sanders, Harris.
But Harris might be replaced by someone else like Booker, Beto or Pete especially if Harris doesn’t finish first or second in S.C.

[treestar]

3. they should all do that, to get out the vote

but just being first isn't enough to make more delegates and overwhelm the other states.

[Bettie]

4. He has no organizers in my county (In Iowa)

and none of his organizers or supporters have shown up at any of the many parades we've done this summer.

Nearly all of the others have had supporters and/or organizers show up to march. I know he's shown up for at least one larger town festival/parade, but I was surprised never to see or get called by a single staffer.

[BeyondGeography]

5. Already?

[LincolnRossiter]

7. So the Biden campaign is playing smart politics?

Say it ain’t so.

[George II]

8. They're not looking to "lower expectations", they're just saying that even if he loses...

...in Iowa and New Hampshire (highly unlikely) Biden is still in a good position to win the nomination.

Look at it this way (and this is NOT "refighting the last primary&quot , in 2016 Hillary Clinton barely won in Iowa, by two-tenths of one percent, and then lost New Hampshire by more than 20%. She went on to easily win the nomination.

The fact is that Iowa and New Hampshire represent about 1.5% of ALL pledged delegates, and they're won proportionally. So even if Biden "lost" both of them" (again, highly unlikely) he'll come out of those two states with a good chunk of delegates with more than 98% of the pledged delegates remaining.

Not only that, but those two states are not representative of the demographics of America or the Democratic Party. They're two very small states which, combined, are almost 92% white.

On the other hand, the next two states, both larger population-wise and Democratic registration-wise, each have more non-white residents than Iowa and New Hampshire combined. Those states mirror the demographics of the Democratic Party much more so than either of the first two states.

[TomCADem]

9. Bernie Will Probably Win Iowa Based On His Anti-Immigration Views and ...

...and xenophobic trade policies.

Look at the Republican primaries in the past. It was a virtual tie between Donald Trump and Ted Cruz back when Trump was not considered a serious candidate, which was due in large to Trump going all-in with anti-immigrant, Muslim ban rhetoric.

Remember, Iowa's Senators are Chuck Grassley and Joni Erst. Of course, the white nationalist Steve King is not only a member of Congress from Iowa, but he is a fan of Bernie's anti-immigrant views:

Link to tweet

?lang=en

Even this year, Bernie again warned against immigrants from "Vietnam and China and Mexico and Latin America coming in"

“Nobody, I mean not many people believe in open borders. If you simply opened the borders, you’d have people from Vietnam and China and Mexico and Latin America coming in. And no one thinks that is a plausible approach. On the other hand, I think the strength of this nation is the diversity and the new ideas from immigrants from all walks of life have given this country. So you need a rational, non-racist immigration policy which welcomes people in from all over the world to improve our economy, but clearly you cannot have open borders.”

The irony is that Sanders’ stance against “a rational, non-racist immigration policy” gets a bit lost when he also thinks that it’s a bad idea to “have people from Vietnam and China and Mexico and Latin America coming in.”

In short, Bernie's campaign is designed to appeal in early primary states with certain less diverse demographics.