The Electoral College Map (9/22/16)

New State Polls (9/22/16)
State	Poll	Date	Margin of Error	Sample	Clinton	Trump	Undecided	Poll Margin	FHQ Margin
Arizona	Insights West	9/12-9/14	+/- 4.5%	484 likely voters	33	37	19	+2	+1.55
California	Insights West	9/12-9/14	+/- 4.3%	515 likely voters	57	30	9	+27	--
California	PPIC	9/9-9/18	+/- 4.5%	1055 likely voters	47	31	4	+16	+20.50
Colorado	Franklin & Marshall/Colorado Mesa	9/14-9/18	+/- 6.3%	350 likely voters	41	34	10	+7	--
Colorado	Quinnipiac	9/13-9/21	+/- 3.9%	644 likely voters	44	42	2	+2	+5.84
Florida	Suffolk	9/19-9/21	+/- 4.4%	500 likely voters	44	45	7	+2	+2.16
Georgia	Quinnipiac	9/13-9/21	+/- 3.9%	638 likely voters	40	47	4	+7	+1.76
Illinois	Emerson	9/19-9/21	+/- 3.6%	700 likely voters	44.5	38.7	7.3	+5.8	+14.68
Iowa	Quinnipiac	9/13-9/21	+/- 4.0%	612 likely voters	37	44	5	+7	+0.51
Louisiana	Southern Media & Opinion Research	9/15-9/17	+/- 4.4%	500 likely voters	32.6	48.9	10.8	+16.3	+13.23
Maryland	Goucher/Field Politics Center	9/17-9/20	+/- 4.3%	514 likely voters	58	25	8	+33	+31.15
Nevada	Insights West	9/12-9/14	+/- 4.9%	398 likely voters	40	42	10	+2	+0.29
North Carolina	New York Times (Upshot)/Siena	9/16-9/19	+/- 3.6%	782 likely voters	41	41	5	+/-0	+0.88
Virginia	Roanoke	9/11-9/20	+/- 3.4%	841 likely voters	44	37	9	+7	--
Virginia	Quinnipiac	9/13-9/21	+/- 3.8%	659 likely voters	45	39	6	+6	+5.94
Washington	Insights West	9/12-9/14	+/- 4.4%	505 likely voters	38	28	14	+10	+12.62
Wisconsin	Emerson	9/19-9/20	+/- 3.6%	700 likely voters	44.5	38.4	4.1	+6.1	+7.03

Polling Quick Hits:
There is a lot to look at today with just 47 days until Election Day: 17 new surveys from 14 states.

Arizona:
Other than the Cronkite survey of Arizona at the end of August, this Insights West poll is the lowest share of support either candidate has garnered in the Grand Canyon state all year. Both polls share a high number of undecideds, but the bottom line, perhaps, is that this is another survey with Trump ahead but in the toss up area. His lead there has stabilized as September has not seen Trump trail Clinton in Arizona.


California:
Clinton's 47 percent in that PPIC poll jumps off the screen at first glance except that it is actually an improvement over her share of support in last PPIC poll from July. She may be lagging behind Obama in 2012 in the Golden state, but Trump continues to trail not only Clinton but Romney's pace four years ago as well. California is still blue.


Colorado:
The two polls out of the Centennial state are pretty representative of the polls over there: Clinton at or just above 40 percent and Trump moving around from the mid-30s to around 40 percent. Colorado could be close, but it will take Trump's support firming up some there to pull it off.


Florida:
Yesterday was a good day for Clinton in Florida, but the polling there has been back and forth throughout September. And there was a snap back toward Trump today in the latest Suffolk survey. Of course, while the polling has been volatile, the average margin in the Sunshine state here at FHQ has not. Clinton's advantage has been stuck in that two to three point range for a while now.


Georgia:
In the Peach state, Trump has found a consistent footing in the mid-40s; something confirmed in Quinnipiac's first survey in the state. On the other hand, Clinton looks a lot like Trump does in a number of the states he will likely need to get to and over 270. In other words, she is stuck around 40 percent and playing catch up.


Illinois:
So far in 2016, the Clinton-Trump race in Illinois has been only sporadically surveyed. It is a shame, then, that the two most recent polls -- two surveys showing a Democrat dipping into the 40s -- come from landline-only Emerson and Loras (whose only other poll was a big outlier in Iowa earlier in the summer). Look, if the other poll from Emerson today -- a Clinton +6 in Wisconsin -- is right on the mark, then it would be highly unusual for Illinois to closer. Or put it this way: if Clinton is only ahead  by around six in Illinois, then the expectation would be that Trump is leading in Wisconsin. None of the polling there has borne that out to this point.


Iowa:
Like Arizona and Georgia, Iowa has seen a string of Trump leads in the polls during September. That streak continues in the latest Quinnipiac survey of the Hawkeye state. What is more is that the near ties in August have been displaced by results that would fall in the Lean Trump category. Those are the types of polls, when strung together, that can build a durable lead. What is Trump's 40 percent problem in a number of the Lean Clinton states is Clinton's problem in the Arizona, Georgia and Iowa trio.


Louisiana:
One could focus on how Trump continues to fall short of Mitt Romney's share of the 2012 vote in states like Louisiana, but that tends to miss the point. Clinton is running well enough behind Trump that the Pelican state is still safely red; off to the far right hand column on the Electoral College Spectrum below.


Maryland:
Like Wyoming yesterday, both candidate are behind the marks set by the 2012 candidates in Maryland. But that matters less in view of the fact that the Old Line state is so far off to the Democratic side of the Spectrum.


Nevada:
Nevada is another state, like a handful above, that has been good to Trump in in September. With only one exception, the New York businessman has led every poll in that stretch but the very first one of the month. The narrow Clinton lead that developed following the conventions disappeared and has  been replaced by a narrow Trump advantage in the state. That edge can only grow so much as long as the poll margins remain as close as they are in polls like the Insights West survey.



North Carolina:
The Tar Heel state has seen no such polling streak for either candidate over the last month. Clinton's overall advantage in the state here at FHQ continues to shrink. But the range of results it a pretty tight band around something close to zero. It is fitting, then, that the new survey of the state from Siena shows just that: a tie. North Carolina, along with Iowa, Nevada and Ohio, are all within a fraction of a point of shifting across the partisan line. Unlike the other three, though, there is no clear trend toward Trump. Instead, North Carolina resembles a closer version of volatile Florida.


Virginia:
As FHQ mentioned in yesterday's update, Virginia is one of those "sticky" Lean Clinton states where the polling (and resulting average) has consistently had Clinton out front by a margin beyond the Lean/Toss Up line (in the Lean category). The two new polls of the Old Dominion from Roanoke and Quinnipiac do nothing to shake up that particular conclusion.


Washington:
The margin in the new Insights West survey looks about right in Washington if past elections are any guide. However, both candidates are collectively only pulling in the support of about two-thirds of the respondents in the poll. That has both Clinton and Trump well behind where Obama and Romney were in the Evergreen state four years ago. Washington is underpolled, but the picture gleaned from what data there is still finds the state in a comfortable area for the Democrats.


Wisconsin:
In the Badger state, just wait on other polling. The Emerson poll there may be in line with expectations, but standing alongside the other survey from the firm today, it looks off. Or something about the two surveys is mismatched. The clear picture in Wisconsin is that Clinton's cushion has dissipated, but that she has a durable, though small, advantage there.


--
There was some subtle shuffling on the Electoral College Spectrum today, but nothing that broke with the patterns established throughout this cycle. No states changed categories and the map and Spectrum remain largely the same. Colorado's addition to the Watch List and into a tight cluster of states (Maine, Pennsylvania and Virginia) along that Lean/Toss Up line.

NOTE: A description of the methodology behind the graduated weighted average of 2016 state-level polling that FHQ uses for these projections can be found here.

The Electoral College Spectrum1
HI-42 (7)	NJ-14 (175)	NH-43 (269 | 273)	TX-38 (155)	LA-8 (58)
MD-10 (17)	DE-3 (178)	RI-43 (273 | 269)	MS-6 (116)	TN-11 (50)
MA-11 (28)	NM-5 (183)	FL-29 (302 | 265)	SC-9 (110)	SD-3 (39)
VT-3 (31)	MN-10 (193)	NC-15 (317 | 236)	AK-3 (101)	ND-3 (36)
CA-55 (86)	WI-10 (203)	OH-18 (335 | 221)	UT-6 (98)	ID-4 (33)
NY-29 (115)	MI-16 (219)	NV-6 (203)	KS-6 (92)	NE-5 (29)
IL-20 (135)	VA-13 (232)	IA-6 (197)	AR-6 (86)	OK-7 (24)
WA-12 (147)	ME-4 (236)	AZ-11 (191)	IN-11 (80)	WV-5 (17)
CT-17 (154)	CO-9 (245)	GA-16 (180)	MT-3 (69)	AL-9 (12)
OR-7 (161)	PA-20 (265)	MO-10 (164)	KY-8 (66)	WY-3 (3)
1 Follow the link for a detailed explanation on how to read the Electoral College Spectrum. 2 The numbers in the parentheses refer to the number of electoral votes a candidate would have if he or she won all the states ranked prior to that state. If, for example, Trump won all the states up to and including New Hampshire (all Clinton's toss up states plus New Hampshire), he would have 273 electoral votes. Trump's numbers are only totaled through the states he would need in order to get to 270. In those cases, Clinton's number is on the left and Trumps's is on the right in bold italics. To keep the figure to 50 cells, Washington, DC and its three electoral votes are included in the beginning total on the Democratic side of the spectrum. The District has historically been the most Democratic state in the Electoral College. 3 New Hampshire and Rhode Island are collectively the states where Clinton crosses the 270 electoral vote threshold to win the presidential election. That line is referred to as the victory line. If those two states are separated with Clinton winning New Hampshire and Trump, Rhode Island, then there would be a tie in the Electoral College.

NOTE: Distinctions are made between states based on how much they favor one candidate or another. States with a margin greater than 10 percent between Clinton and Trump are "Strong" states. Those with a margin of 5 to 10 percent "Lean" toward one of the two (presumptive) nominees. Finally, states with a spread in the graduated weighted averages of both the candidates' shares of polling support less than 5 percent are "Toss Up" states. The darker a state is shaded in any of the figures here, the more strongly it is aligned with one of the candidates. Not all states along or near the boundaries between categories are close to pushing over into a neighboring group. Those most likely to switch -- those within a percentage point of the various lines of demarcation -- are included on the Watch List below.

The Watch List1
State	Switch
Arkansas	from Lean Trump	to Strong Trump
Colorado	from Lean Clinton	to Toss Up Clinton
Delaware	from Strong Clinton	to Lean Clinton
Indiana	from Strong Trump	to Lean Trump
Iowa	from Toss Up Trump	to Toss Up Clinton
Maine	from Lean Clinton	to Toss Up Clinton
Missouri	from Lean Trump	to Toss Up Trump
Nevada	from Toss Up Trump	to Toss Up Clinton
New Hampshire	from Lean Clinton	to Toss Up Clinton
New Jersey	from Strong Clinton	to Lean Clinton
North Carolina	from Toss Up Clinton	to Toss Up Trump
Ohio	from Toss Up Clinton	to Toss Up Trump
Oregon	from Strong Clinton	to Lean Clinton
Pennsylvania	from Lean Clinton	to Toss Up Clinton
Rhode Island	from Lean Clinton	to Toss Up Clinton
Virginia	from Lean Clinton	to Toss Up Clinton
1 Graduated weighted average margin within a fraction of a point of changing categories.

2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: LOUISIANA

Updated 3.5.16

This is part twenty of a series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation rules by state. The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2016 -- especially relative to 2012 -- in order to gauge the potential impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. For this cycle the RNC recalibrated its rules, cutting the proportionality window in half (March 1-14), but tightening its definition of proportionality as well. While those alterations will trigger subtle changes in reaction at the state level, other rules changes -- particularly the new binding requirement placed on state parties -- will be more noticeable. 

LOUISIANA

Election type: primary
Date: March 5
Number of delegates: 46 [25 at-large, 18 congressional district, 3 automatic]
Allocation method: proportional
Threshold to qualify for delegates: 20%¹
2012: primary/caucus

--
Changes since 2012
Digging down, there are a number of changes to the Louisiana Republican Party delegate allocation rules for 2016. First, the state legislature in the Pelican state moved the presidential primary up a couple of weeks to early March back in 2014. That shift preceded the regional push to form the SEC primary. Still, the Louisiana presidential primary will fall just a few days later, the weekend after a number of southern states hold contests on March 1.

Secondly, delegates will be more clearly allocated through the presidential primary election. Four years ago, the at-large delegates were allocated based on the statewide vote in the primary while the congressional district delegates remained officially unbound (after having been selected in district caucuses). Unlike four years ago, then, Louisiana Republicans have linked the allocation of delegates -- both at-large and congressional district -- to the results of the presidential primary. There are still district caucuses, but the voting there will in part select the delegates ultimately allocated and bound to candidates based on the primary results.


Thresholds
Another change is in the qualifying threshold. In 2012, a candidate had to receive 25% of the statewide vote to qualify for any of the at-large delegates at stake in Louisiana. For 2016, just 20% is necessary. That is the maximum qualifying threshold allowed by the RNC. [Truth be told, that was true in 2012 as well. Louisiana exceeded it.]

As has been witnessed in other states, that 20% barrier has a limiting effect on who and how many candidates actually qualify for delegates. In a crowded field, fewer candidates would likely cross the line. As the field winnows, however, that number increases, but only to a point. Only as many as five candidates could qualify and that is only in the event that all five tie at the top with exactly 20%. In other words, somewhere between one and four candidates are likely to be allocated any of the at-large delegates.

There is no similar threshold conditioning the allocation of congressional district delegates. Unless one candidate runs away from the rest in a congressional district, then functionally, the top three finishers in a district vote will be allocated one delegate each.

Additionally, Louisiana Republicans have not put a winner-take-all threshold in place. Even if a candidate were to win a majority of the vote either statewide or on the congressional district level, it would not trigger an allocation of all of the (unit-specific) delegates to that candidate. It is always proportional (by RNC rules) with some caveats.


Delegate allocation (at-large and automatic delegates)
The Louisiana delegates will be proportionally allocated to candidates based on the outcome of the March 5 primary in the Pelican state. Based on an earlier poll conducted on the race in Louisiana (the late September 2015 WWL-TV/Clarus survey), the allocation would look something like this²:

• Carson (23%) -- 28 delegates

• Trump (19%) -- 0 delegates
• Bush (10%) -- 0 delegates 
• Rubio (9%) -- 0 delegates 
• Fiorina (7%) -- 0 delegates 
• Cruz (6%) -- 0 delegates 
• Huckabee (4%) -- 0 delegates 
• Jindal (3%) -- 0 delegates
• Kasich (3%) -- 0 delegates
• Christie (2%) -- 0 delegates

The above allocation seems quite cut and dry: Ben Carson, using these numbers in Louisiana, would be the only candidate to qualify for at-large delegates. The retired neurosurgeon would be the only candidate north of the 20% threshold that Louisiana Republicans have in place to guide the delegate allocation there.

Appearance, however, might not match reality here because there is a lot left unsaid in the Louisiana delegate allocation rules. Yes, a candidate must receive at least 20% of the statewide vote to qualify for any of the 28 at-large and automatic delegates. Yet, the above simulated allocation -- a backdoor winner-take-all scenario statewide -- is not be how the allocation works in practice.

There is no contingency specified in the event that only one candidate surpasses the threshold.³ And that, in turn, leaves some of this to interpretation. The way FHQ has treated other states in similar situations is that if only one candidate clears the threshold, then that candidate claims all of those delegates -- either at-large and/or congressional district -- unless explicitly prohibited by the state party rules.

Well, there is no such prohibition in Louisiana. In fact, the language of the rule is pretty important here (Rule 4c).

...each Republican candidate for President who has qualified for the 2016 Presidential Preference Primary Election may submit a list of 46 potential at-large delegates and alternate delegates. Presidential candidates receiving more than 20% of the statewide vote on Primary Election Day will be allocated the same proportion, rounded by the Executive Committee, of all 23 at-large delegates and alternate delegates...

That actually indirectly prohibits a backdoor winner-take-all allocation to Ben Carson in the simulation above. Carson would only be allocated his raw percentage of the at-large delegates (using the statewide vote rather than the qualifying vote as the denominator in the allocation equation). In other words, rather than receiving all 28 of the at-large delegates (for being the only qualifying candidate), Carson would only net 23% of those 28 delegates. That is just 6.44 delegates, a far cry from the 28 above.

The catch is that the Louisiana Republican Party Executive Committee has the ambiguous discretion of rounding the delegate totals. That and the above fact about raw percentages matter whether there is just one candidate above the 20% qualifying threshold or multiple candidates (as is likely the case with a March 5 contest). Without adjusting the denominator in the allocation equation from the total votes cast to just the votes of the qualifying candidates, the Louisiana Republican Party has quietly and within the RNC rules, mind you, created a group of unbound delegates.

In the above example, Carson would get 6 or 7 at-large delegates depending on how the Executive Committee rounds that 6.44. Again, the committee has the latitude to set that allocation. But it is based on the "same proportion" of the vote that Carson received statewide. That leaves 21 or 22 unallocated delegates. Those would theoretically be delegates selected and sent to the national convention unbound (but not necessarily unpledged).

Now, that leaves a couple of items to note. First, this is quite reminiscent of the 2012 Louisiana delegate allocation rules with regard to at-large delegates. The congressional district delegates were unbound in Louisiana four years ago. But second, there likely will not be such a large number of unallocated delegates. Again, by March 5 there is likely to have been some winnowing of the field. With that shrinking of the field, the chances of a smaller group of candidates qualifying for delegates -- more than one but fewer than five -- increases.

But even if that threshold is relaxed to 10% -- so that both Trump and Bush, using the polling data above, qualify for delegates -- the three of them only add to 52% of the vote. That means that, depending on the rounding by the LAGOP Executive Committee, approximately 48% of the at-large delegates (13 delegates of 28) would be unallocated to candidates and thus unbound for the national convention.

Is that hugely consequential? In the grand scheme of things -- the race to 1237 -- probably not. However, this is yet another little wildcard to file away for when the process gets to Louisiana. But the bottom line is that this seemingly was a move by the Louisiana Republican Party to comply with the RNC rules, but retain something similar to the way the party had allocated delegates in the past. Then again, perhaps LAGOP was not that sophisticated.


Delegate allocation (congressional district delegates)
Where the state party lost some discretion on that score is in the allocation of congressional district delegates. Four years ago, those delegates were elected in congressional district caucuses and were left unbound heading into the national convention in Tampa. For 2016, those delegates will selected at the state convention based on the results of the March 5 primary in each of the six congressional districts in the Pelican state.

The same 20% threshold to qualify for at-large delegates does not apply to the allocation of congressional district delegates. Instead, there is no qualifying threshold. Again, as has been mentioned elsewhere, there are only so many ways to proportionally allocate three congressional district delegates. Even with no threshold, then, this type of allocation tends to function as if it was a top three system: the top three candidates all are allocated one delegate. The exception is if one candidate wins a majority of the vote within a congressional district. In that case, such a candidate would round up and qualify for two delegates.⁴ Whether a candidate reaches that majority threshold, though, greatly depends on the extent to which the field has winnowed ahead of the Louisiana primary.


Binding
At-large and congressional district delegates who are bound to candidates will be bound to them only on the first ballot of the roll call nomination vote in Cleveland (see Rule 4f). Furthermore, delegates of candidates who have suspended their campaign are no longer bound to those candidates on that initial roll call vote.


--
State allocation rules are archived here.


--
¹ The 20% threshold is used by the Louisiana Republican Party to determine which candidates qualify for the statewide, at-large delegates. Though the party rules state that there are just 23 at-large delegates, citing Rule 14, there are 25 at-large delegates apportioned to the state by virtue of the RNC rules. The congressional district delegates are allocated to candidates based on the vote within those districts but with no threshold.

² This poll is being used as an example of how delegates could be allocated under these new rules in Louisiana and not as a forecast of the outcome in the Pelican state primary.

³ More alarming, perhaps, is that there is no provision spelling out the allocation process if no candidate clears 20%.

⁴ That is something of a leap in reasoning considering that the rounding rules are unspecified. If the rounding is always up, regardless of the fraction, then a candidate could round up to two delegates with just a little less than 34% of the vote in a congressional district. All that is known for sure is that the Executive Committee does not explicitly have the same latitude in the rounding of congressional district delegates as it does in at-large delegates.

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Louisiana Legislature Passes Budget on to Jindal, Presidential Primary Funding Included

On the final day of the 2015 legislative session, Louisiana state legislators pushed through a package of bills to fund the government in the Pelican state for fiscal year 2015-16. The foundation of that budget includes funding for the 2016 presidential primary in the state, money that was not initially included in Governor Bobby Jindal's (R) original proposal to the legislature in March.

The governor is expected to sign the legislation. That keeps the Louisiana presidential primary on Saturday, March 5 next year. Democrats in the state are already slated to utilize the primary allocating delegates to the national convention, but Pelican state Republicans have in the past used both the primary and caucuses for allocating their delegates. That March 5 date will have Louisiana Democrats sharing calendar space with caucuses in Kansas and Nebraska. Louisiana Republicans, on the other hand, will have the date to themselves, a bridge between the SEC primary on March 1 and the primary in neighboring Mississippi on March 8.

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Amended Louisiana House Budget Would Fund Presidential Primary

Back in March when Governor Bobby Jindal (R) unveiled his budget proposal for the 2015-16 fiscal year, it quickly became clear that there was not enough money appropriated to fund the 2016 presidential primary in Louisiana. This led to subsequent speculative discussions about whether Louisiana caucuses would be more favorable to a potential Jindal run for the Republican nomination and whether a possible November primary (consolidated with the 2015 runoff elections).

Speculation aside, the no-primary scare may have passed. An amended version of the budget -- now in the Louisiana House -- would set aside more than $3.3 million for the presidential primary next year. HB 1, the budget bill, has been engrossed and will this next week have a third reading vote.

Louisiana is currently slated to hold a Saturday, March 5 primary pending funding in this budget passing and being signed by Governor Jindal.

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A November 2015 Presidential Primary in Louisiana?

A month ago FHQ discussed the state of play in Louisiana after it became clear that no money had been included in the governor's budget proposal for any elections after December 2015 (during the 2015-16 fiscal year). That would mean no funds for the March 5 presidential primary in the Pelican state. At the time, FHQ suggested that it was likely that Louisiana Republicans would simply move all of its delegate allocation/selection into the caucuses/convention process that it has used for the last several cycles to allocate at least some of its delegates to the national convention.

Now, however, there is a different idea floating around to circumvent the budgetary shortfall. Former Louisiana Secretary of State Jim Brown has suggested combining the presidential primary with the November 31 gubernatorial runoff election:

Finding it [funds for the presidential primary] could be tough. Brown's idea is to stage the Louisiana primary on the cheap; combining it with the gubernatorial run-off, November 31st. 

“Be the first in all of America to hold a primary,” Brown told KTBS, “get massive national attention and it wouldn't cost us one penny.” 

Brown said several lawmakers have approached him about his idea.

Consolidating elections as a means of saving money is nothing new. Such maneuvering was common in 2012 as separate presidential primaries were eliminated from New Jersey to Arkansas to California. But in all of those cases, the consolidation process meant moving to a later date on the primary calendar. This Louisiana proposal -- and folks, it is very definitely at the idea stage -- would entail moving forward/earlier and, in fact, into another calendar year.

Obviously, Louisiana scheduling a presidential primary in late November would be a violation of both national parties' delegate selection rules. And expect Louisiana legislators to get an earful from the national parties either directly or indirectly should they decide to move forward with this idea. But if were to move forward in bill form and become law, that could push the carve-out states -- Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina -- into early November of this year.

Just don't count on that happening.

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Louisiana May Not Have a 2016 Presidential Primary

According to Louisiana Secretary of State Tom Schedler (R), Louisiana will not hold a presidential primary in 2016. Here's Schedler from Mark Ballard at The Advocate:

“I want to have a presidential preference primary as long as you pay for it,” Schedler told the Louisiana House Appropriations Committee during the panel’s department-by-department tour of Jindal’s budget proposal for the fiscal year that begins July 1. 

“He hasn’t funded elections past December,” Schedler said about Jindal.  A presidential preference primary would be held in the Spring 2016 and would cost about $3.5 million.

This may or may not be a situation similar to the one in Massachusetts. The battle lines, if one wants to call them that, are the same: governor (and elections budget) and secretary of state (with a bottom line amount/expense for elections). The difference in Louisiana are a threefold:

1. In this case, the governor (Bobby Jindal) and the secretary of state are of the same party, the Republican Party.

2. The Louisiana situation is such that there is no money for any elections beyond December. Any elections expense beyond that point and up to the end of the fiscal year in June cannot be funded. Louisiana does have gubernatorial and state legislative elections later this year. In Massachusetts, the presidential primary is seemingly the lowest priority election for 2016 and thus expendable. A similar priority list may be driving the secretary of state's statements today.

3. Louisiana Republicans already utilize a two-tiered delegate selection/allocation process. In 2012, there were both a primary and caucuses. The caucuses allocated just under 40% of the total Louisiana delegation. While Massachusetts Republicans also have caucuses, that process has only guided the delegate selection part of the process; identifying the people who will fill the delegate slots allocated to candidates based on the primary results. The transition to primary/caucuses to caucuses may be smoother than a transition from one to the other. Those congressional district caucuses/conventions were in April in 2012.

One final thing to consider is that Massachusetts Secretary of State Galvin made the same claims in 2011 that he made just last week. Yet, there was still a presidential primary on the first Tuesday in March 2012. There is no such history in Louisiana.

The primary may not be able to be funded or the state government might find a way to pull it off. But will legislators be motivated to go on that quest for funds if they know a caucuses/convention process is already in place?

Currently, Louisiana is slated to conduct a presidential primary on the first Saturday in March, the Saturday just after the proposed SEC primary on March 1.

UPDATE: More from Greg Hilburn at The News Star (Gannett).

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Louisiana not inclined to join 'SEC' presidential primary day in 2016

The story from the Times-Picayune.

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A couple of notes:
1. Louisiana, as the story notes, has already moved its presidential primary for the 2016 cycle. Moving again would be fairly atypical. States, if they move at all, usually only move once per cycle. Double moves happen, but they are rare and recent occurrences. Both California and New Jersey moved twice ahead of 2008.¹

2. This would likely be a wise move on Louisiana's part. A Saturday, March 5 primary would be proximate enough -- regionally and on the calendar -- to the proposed SEC primary on March 1 to benefit from the regional attention. However, being on a separate date means that Louisiana would be less likely to be lost in the shuffle among larger neighboring states (with more delegates) on March 1. During the following week, March 8 is also a point on the calendar that is sparsely populated with contests. That is particularly true if Alabama and Mississippi move up a week; leaving only Ohio and the Hawaii Republican caucuses. Such a line up is unlikely to pull the campaign immediately out of the South following March 1.

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¹ California moved from March to June before moving into February. New Jersey first moved up to late February before bumping the Garden state primary up a few more weeks to early February.

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