The Democratic National Committee is considering a resolution at its winter meeting now underway that would shake up the presidential nomination process ahead of the 2024 election.
The Des Moines Register reported the draft resolution could jeopardize the status of Iowa’s caucuses as the traditional first stop on the nomination calendar by putting a renewed focus on primary elections and demographic diversity in determining the pecking order for state primaries.
The Rules and Bylaws Committee is expected to take up the resolution, which would require states to apply for a waiver to hold their nomination contests before others and expand the number of early voting states to five.
Under the resolution, Iowa could still apply to lead off the nomination contest, but states that hold primaries would be given preference in the application process. The Register reported the draft resolutions say another consideration would be a state’s diversity, “including ethnic, geographic (and) union representation.”
The discussion at the DNC’s winter meeting in Washington comes two years after Iowa’s caucuses ended in chaos and delays after the computer app the Iowa Democratic Party relied on to collect and transmit results crashed.
The political circus was a nightmare for Iowa Democrats, who for years have fiercely defended the lead-off role the predominantly white state traditionally plays in presidential nominations. They have argued that winning under the caucus system in the state has less to do with raising money than with spending time meeting with voters.
New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina have rounded out the first four stops on the nomination calendar.
The ugly ending also frustrated the candidates, the campaigns and volunteers who had spent time, energy and money organizing in the state. Local leaders said it put a major damper on what was otherwise an exciting contest.
It all revived the criticism of the caucuses, which requires voters to gather in gyms, school classrooms and other venues and listen to other community members make their case for their preferred candidates before they vote.
When the caucus results were finally counted in 2020, Sen. Bernie Sanders won the popular vote among Democrats but former South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg won the most delegates. In the fall election, Democratic nominee Joe Biden lost to then-President Donald Trump in Iowa by 8 percentage points.
• Seth McLaughlin can be reached at smclaughlin@washingtontimes.com.
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