Friday, September 18, 2015

North Carolina Inching Closer to a March 15 Presidential Primary

From Colin Campbell at the News and Observer in Raleigh:
House and Senate leaders have agreed to move all 2016 primaries to March 15, according to House Speaker Tim Moore.  
The move would mean candidates for president, governor, U.S. Senate and down-ballot races would all go before voters earlier than the May date used in past primaries.  
“The consensus is to move the primary to March,” Moore told reporters after a midnight budget vote Friday morning. “The rationale behind moving the primaries was (presidential elections) have a very high turnout.”
The devil's going to be in the details on this one. The March 15 primary date has been something of a foregone conclusion for a while now. That move got held up by drawn-out budget negotiations and then the push -- in the context of those same budget negotiations -- to hold all of the state's primaries on the same date to save the state money.

That all seems settled, but it remains to be seen whether the changes to delegate allocation language -- to make the Tar Heel state a winner-take-all primary -- carries over into the conference committee report that will be considered by both the North Carolina House and Senate. That is something to watch as this moves forward.


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