Iowa Democrats propose ‘virtual’ caucuses in 2020
The Iowa Democratic Party on Monday proposed the biggest changes to the state’s famed caucuses in nearly 50 years by recommending Iowans be able to participate virtually. If approved, the measure would allow people to caucus using telephones or smart devices during the days leading up to the Feb. 3 caucus night. It’s a dramatic shift from the current system in which caucusgoers have to physically show up at a site — often a school, church or community center— and show their support for presidential candidates by standing in groups. If the group doesn’t meet an established threshold, the participants have to select another candidate. It’s an often chaotic process that plays out before banks of television cameras on an evening that formally ushers in the presidential primary season. But proponents say it will help address criticism that the caucuses are difficult to attend for single parents, people who work at night and the elderly. “Through this additional process we’re going to be able to give more Iowans a chance to participate in this process,” Iowa Democratic Party Chairman Troy Price said. “Whether someone is a shift worker, a single parent, in the military, living overseas or experiencing mobility issues, this process will now give these individuals a voice in selecting the next president of the United States.” And while Price says the proposed changes are the state party’s effort to open the process often described by critics as antiquated, it was also required by the Democratic National Committee. The results are Iowa Democrats’ attempt at threading the needle of complying while maintaining the essence of the caucuses, which are real-time meetings of fellow partisans. Presidential candidates are already beginning to swarm the state — three were here this weekend. They’ll likely try to determine whether a virtual caucus would help them turn out more of their supporters. “I suspect presidential campaigns who we’ve shared this information with are going to be trying to figure out how to get their members to participate in this,” Price added. Party officials said they didn’t know how many people would take advantage of the new format or how campaigns might seek to capitalize on it. A key element of the proposal, which now goes before Iowa Democrats to comment on for 30 days, is that, no matter how many Iowans participate virtually, their contribution will be factored as a flat 10 percent of the total turnout, apportioned by congressional district. Price said officials reached 10 percent as a starting point, uncertain of how many people might join virtually. “This is a new system so we don’t have any data to tell if this number is too high or too low,” Price said. “And so we are starting the conversation at the 10 percent threshold, and if it goes gangbusters this year, then we will have conversations in subsequent years about if we need to make adjustments.” Hillary Clinton, the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee who narrowly beat Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders in Iowa that year, criticized the caucus process for deterring late-shift workers and others less able to steal away for an evening of political wrangling. “Campaigns must decide how to organize for that 10 percent,” said veteran Iowa Democratic caucus operative Jeff Link, who did not work for Clinton in 2016 and is not affiliated with a candidate heading into 2020. In another noteworthy development, the state party said it would release the raw data of preferences by caucusgoers, information that is typically kept confidential. The caucuses are a series of preference tests in which candidates without a certain level of support are rendered unviable. This data would give a first glimpse of the candidates’ support before caucusgoers abandon their first choices to side with more viable contenders. The Iowa caucuses are scheduled for February 3, 2020. The proposal won’t be finalized until the spring. Republished with permission from the Associated Press
GOP frets over West Virginia as 4 states decide primaries
Voters in the heart of Trump country are ready to decide the fate of Don Blankenship, a brash West Virginia businessman and GOP outsider with a checkered past who is testing the appeal of President Donald Trump’s outsider playbook in one of the nation’s premiere U.S. Senate contests. The stakes are high for a Republican Party bracing for major losses in this fall’s midterm elections. A victory on Tuesday for Blankenship, an ex-convict who has run racially charged ads, could make it hard for Republicans to pick up a Senate seat in deep-red West Virginia come November. But the anti-establishment fervor unleashed by Trump’s 2016 campaign has proved difficult for GOP leaders to rein in. On the eve of state’s Senate primary election, Trump himself warned on Twitter that a Blankenship win would destroy Republicans’ chance of defeating Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin this fall. Blankenship “can’t win the General Election in your State…No way!” the president wrote of the retired coal executive, who was released from prison last year for his role in the deadliest U.S. mine disaster in four decades. Firing back at the Republican president, Blankenship described himself as “Trumpier than Trump” as he shrugged off Trump’s call for local Republicans to support one of his two opponents. “West Virginia will send the swamp a message: No one, and I mean no one, will tell us how to vote,” Blankenship declared. On Tuesday, West Virginia will join Indiana, North Carolina and Ohio in hosting primary elections in states Trump carried in 2016. The Republican contests largely feature candidates jockeying to be seen as the most conservative, the most anti-Washington and the most loyal to the president. In Indiana, Republicans will pick from among three Senate candidates who have spent much of the race praising Trump and bashing one another. The winner will take on another vulnerable Democrat, Sen. Joe Donnelly, this fall. In Ohio, Republicans will likely nominate a more conservative candidate than outgoing GOP Gov. John Kasich, a 2016 presidential candidate and frequent Trump critic. Even Kasich’s former running mate, Lt. Gov. Mary Taylor, has pledged to unwind some of Kasich’s centrist policies, including the expansion of the Medicaid government insurance program. Ohio also features primary elections in both parties to decide the candidates for an August special election to replace GOP Rep. Pat Tiberi, who resigned earlier in the year. North Carolina Republicans will weigh in on the fate of Republican Rep. Robert Pittenger, who faces a primary challenger who almost upset him two years ago. Pittenger features Trump prominently in his campaign, while challenger Mark Harris, a prominent Charlotte pastor, has called Pittenger a creature of Washington who refuses to help Trump “drain that swamp.” Yet none of Tuesday’s contests is expected to have more impact on the 2018 midterm landscape than West Virginia. Blankenship has embraced Trump’s tactics — casting himself as a victim of government persecution and seizing on xenophobia, if not racism — to stand out in a crowded Republican field that includes state Attorney General Patrick Morrisey and Republican congressman Evan Jenkins. Republicans have long seen the state as a prime opportunity to expand the party’s two-seat majority in the Senate by defeating Manchin. On paper at least, the GOP prospects look good: No state gave Trump a larger margin of victory than West Virginia, where Trump defeated Democrat Hillary Clinton by 42 points. Yet Republicans across Washington are convinced that Blankenship, an unapologetic conservative who lives part time near Las Vegas, cannot defeat Manchin. In addition to Trump’s warning, the head of the Senate Republican campaign arm has highlighted Blankenship’s criminal history. And a group allied with the national GOP, known as Mountain Families PAC, has spent more than $1.2 million in attack ads against Blankenship in recent weeks. The retired businessman was released from prison less than a year ago for his role in a 2010 mine explosion that left 29 men dead. Blankenship led the company that owned the mine and was sentenced to a year in prison for conspiring to break safety laws, a misdemeanor. He has repeatedly blamed government regulators for the disaster, casting himself as the victim of an overzealous Obama-era Justice Department — an argument Trump regularly uses to dismiss federal agents investigating his campaign’s ties to Russia. Blankenship has used race and ethnicity to appeal to supporters in the campaign’s final days, just as Trump did throughout his campaign. The Senate candidate took aim at Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., in an ad claiming that McConnell has created jobs for “China people” and that his “China family” has given him millions of dollars. McConnell’s wife is U.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, who was born in Taiwan. Blankenship also called McConnell “Cocaine Mitch” in a previous ad. That reference stems from a 2014 magazine article alleging drugs were found aboard a commercial cargo ship owned by Chao’s family. Arizona Republican Sen. Jeff Flake, a frequent Trump critic, suggested that Blankenship presents a moral problem for the GOP, not just a political one. He said he’s ready to donate to Manchin’s campaign if Blankenship becomes the GOP nominee. “You get somebody like that in the Senate, you might get us one seat but you lose your soul,” Flake said. Republished with permission from the Associated Press.
