"Democrats set January deadline for states to apply for early 2028 primary contests"

Meg Kinnard at The AP with the details on the DNC Rules and Bylaws-passed resolution guiding the selection of early primary states for 2028:

"The Rules and Bylaws Committee of the Democratic National Committee on Monday approved a plan giving states until January 16 to submit applications to hold voting contests in the early window ahead of Super Tuesday, when a massive haul of delegates will be awarded.

"Four or five states will get an early slot, and all four regions — East, Midwest, South and West — must be represented, according to the framework."

And from Caroline Vakil at The Hill:

"States seeking to be one of the first stomping grounds to weigh in on the 2028 Democratic presidential primary will be evaluated on rigorousness, efficiency and fairness."

More from Elena Schneider at Politico:

"The DNC planned to reevaluate the order ahead of the 2028 primary, but the committee’s moves take on fresh significance for a wide-open presidential primary process, in which the voting order of states will likely impact candidates’ strategy. But unlike in 2022, when Biden set the calendar, the DNC now has control of the process.

"Jockeying for a calendar spot has already started, though several DNC members privately said they expect the composition of the early window to resemble previous years — which included South Carolina, New Hampshire, Nevada and Michigan. The order of the states may prove trickier than which states are included."

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And there were reactions on the state level...

Iowa (via Brianne Pfannenstiel at the Des Moines Register):

"'I am disappointed the DNC is already backtracking on its promise for an open and democratic process by rushing through this proposal,' [Iowa Democratic Party Chair Rita] Hart said in a statement. 'Whatever fake timeline the DNC’s Rules and Bylaws Committee tries to put on this process, I remain committed to having continued family conversations regarding our Iowa Caucus process with members of our State Central Committee, our campaigns and Democrats across the state.'

"She said 'all options are on the table' as the party weighs where to go next."

Nevada (via Mini Racker at the Nevada Independent)¹: 

"'In Nevada, we’re very respectful of the process,' [Nevada DNC member Artie] Blanco said... 'We don’t cry about it; we don’t get angry. We just go back and we start the fight again.'"

New Hampshire (via Josh Rogers at New Hampshire Public Radio):

"New Hampshire Democratic Party Chairman Ray Buckley participated in Monday's meeting, but did not speak. Yet in a memo Buckley released last week, he argued that New Hampshire deserves to lead off Democrats’ 2028 nominating calendar because it is a state that fairly tests candidates by making them go face to face with voters.

"'We believe that we should go first because we are a small, purple state with unmatched civic participation. In other words, there is no other state that better meets the efficiency, rigorousness, and fairness criteria needed in our presidential nominating process,' Buckley said.

"'New Hampshire's racial diversity continues to increase, especially among our youngest Granite Staters,' Buckley wrote, adding that New Hampshire has a record of diversity that extends beyond race.

"'We are the only state in the country to elect a woman both governor and senator — which we’ve done multiple times,' Buckley said."

--

¹ Racker's quotes from Virginia DNC member Elaine Kamark on the early state selection process for 2024 were particularly interesting as well. They shed some additional light on the hours before Biden released his letter on the 2024 calendar:

"'I think New Hampshire would have ended up first,' Elaine Kamarck, a Brookings senior fellow who authored Primary Politics and is a veteran member of the committee, told The Nevada Independent. 'Because of the history of New Hampshire and because it’s in the Eastern time zone.'"

 And...

"'We’d been asking for guidance for months, so there was kind of relief,' Kamarck said. 'We didn’t know if the president was going to weigh in or not. So it was kind of like, ‘OK, good. He’s finally made his wishes known.’ Some of us thought that, ‘Well, maybe he just won’t weigh in. You know, maybe it’s up to us.’ But he did.'"

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More at FHQ Plus (subscription)...

Now we know what they're looking for.

The DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee met earlier this week and passed a resolution laying out what the party wants in the 4 or 5 early states for 2028.

"DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee Votes to Establish Procedure for Presidential Nominating Calendar Early State Selection Process"

The following is a press release for the DNC on the October 27 Rules and Bylaws Committee that adopted a resolution laying out the guidelines for state parties to apply for early spots on the 2028 primary calendar:

Today, the DNC’s Rules and Bylaws Committee (RBC) voted to pass a resolution to establish the next steps in determining the early window of the 2028 presidential nominating calendar. The Resolution lays out criteria to ensure a rigorous, efficient, and fair process that will deliver the strongest possible Democratic nominee for president. Following the Resolution’s passage, Democratic State Parties will receive a formal Request for Proposal (RFP), which they can complete and submit to the RBC if they wish to apply for the early window.

Highlights from the Resolution and RFP include:

• The Resolution and RFP establish the fundamental goal for the calendar process of “produc[ing] the strongest possible Democratic nominee for president.”
• The Resolution instructs the committee to execute the calendar process “in the most transparent, open, and fair manner feasible,” requiring the RBC to provide “adequate, clear, and timely notice on major milestones and requirements.”
• The Resolution and RFP establish three pillars that will be used to evaluate early state applicants. Those pillars are:

• Rigorousness: the lineup of early states must be a comprehensive test of candidates with diverse groups of voters that are key to winning the general election;
• Fairness: the lineup of early states must be affordable, practical for candidates, and not exhaust their resources unreasonably, precluding them from effectively participating in future contests;
• Efficiency: the practical ability to run a fair, transparent, and inclusive primary or caucus.

• The Resolution further establishes that the RBC must select between four and five states for the early window and must include one state from each of the DNC’s four geographic regions (East, Midwest, South, and West).
• The Resolution establishes the deadline for state RFP submissions as January 16, 2026.

RBC Co-Chairs Minyon Moore and James Roosevelt, Jr. released the following statement:

“Establishing the nominating calendar is one of the most important responsibilities of the Rules and Bylaws Committee, and we are committed to executing a fair and transparent process that will deliver a battle-tested nominee who will win back the White House for Democrats. Today, the RBC took a crucial first step in charting our path for 2028.”

DNC Chair Ken Martin released the following statement:

“The Rules and Bylaws Committee is hard at work designing a nominating calendar that will result in the strongest possible Democratic nominee for president through a fair, rigorous, and efficient process.”

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More at FHQ Plus (subscription)...

Now we know what they're looking for.

The DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee met earlier this week and passed a resolution laying out what the party wants in the 4 or 5 early states for 2028.

New Hampshire Democrats make a pitch for first ahead of DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee meeting

Elena Schneider in Politico Playbook has the details on a memo making the rounds from New Hampshire Democrats arguing the case for why the Granite state should go first in 2028:

"Fight for first: New Hampshire Democrats are circulating a memo to DNC members, arguing their case to return to the first-in-the-nation primary slot, after being demoted ahead of the 2024 cycle. The memo, scooped by POLITICO’s Elena Schneider, argues that New Hampshire should retain its coveted first-place slot, not “based simply on tradition,” but because “we are a small, purple state with unmatched civic participation.” The memo takes a more conciliatory tone, in a shift for the state that held an unsanctioned primary in 2024 with in-state Democrats organizing a write-in campaign on behalf of then-President Joe Biden. It is timed ahead of Monday’s meeting of the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee , which is charged with setting the Democrats’ presidential primary calendar."

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Noteworthy: A case was always going to be made by New Hampshire Democrats to keep (or return, depending on one's perspective) the Granite state first in the order of primaries in the Democratic presidential nomination process for 2028. And given that similar memos were already circulated by Nevada Democrats around the August Rules and Bylaws Committee (RBC) meeting, one from the Silver state's Democratic counterparts back east is no surprise. This is an introductory maneuver, one made to fit the New Hampshire primary into the rubric voiced by DNC Chair Ken Martin and likely to be taken up in the form of a resolution during the October RBC meeting. That is why the state party is playing up the small and purple virtues of New Hampshire.

But FHQ does not read that as taking a more conciliatory tone. After all, the rubber has yet to meet the road in all of this. New Hampshire Democrats did not strike a defiant tone with the DNC until after the calendar rules for 2024 were initially passed by the RBC in late 2022. Any tone shift from New Hampshire Democrats this time around will not be truly felt until a similar juncture in the 2028 cycle (if at all). Of course they are playing "conciliatory" now. The calendar rules are still undecided. 

"DNC set to start process for deciding which states will vote earliest in 2028 presidential primaries"

Hunter Woodall at CBS News provides an update what the Democratic National Committee is likely to look for in states that will make up the early window on the 2028 presidential primary calendar:

"A source familiar with the calendar efforts detailed the materials written by the co-chairs of the party's rules and bylaws panel, including a draft resolution and request for proposal, were shared Friday with members. At the late October meeting, members will have a chance to revise and vote on the work.

"The resolution outlines standards, which according to the source, cover the following:

• "'Rigorousness: the lineup of early states must be a comprehensive test of candidates with diverse groups of voters that are key to winning the general election;
• Efficiency: the lineup of early states must be affordable and practical for candidates and not exhaust their resources, precluding them from effectively participating in future contests;
• Fairness: the practical ability to run a fair, transparent and inclusive primary or caucus.'

"The plans call for four or five states to be chosen by DNC members to hold a nominating contest in what's known as the "early window," which comes before states begin voting in large numbers on Super Tuesday and the weeks afterwards. Under the draft, each of the four regions being focused on by the DNC, the East, Midwest, South and West, would need to have at least one state from its respective areas be chosen."

--

Noteworthy: The draft resolution cited above lays out criteria for those state parties petitioning the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee (RBC) to be among the primaries and caucuses included in the early primary calendar in 2028. The points are consistent with those that Chair Ken Martin laid out in early August, but it also fleshes that out some by carrying over elements from the 2024 process. For starters, the party is looking for regional representation across four regions of the country in the early window. The RBC will also look to fill the early window -- ranging from the first Tuesday in February to the first Monday in March -- with four to five contests. [There are five Tuesdays in February 2028.]

One thing that is not included in the 2028 list that was among the criteria for 2024 (and will be just as inescapable now)? Feasibility.

More at FHQ Plus (subscription):

DNC Chair Martin lays out early state checklist for 2028

"DNC Chair says Democrats plan to be competitive in Iowa despite caucus uncertainty"

Skylar Tallal at KGAN/CBS2 pulls back the curtain on DNC Chair Martin's latest comments on Democrats running in Iowa in 2026 and the caucuses there in 2028:

"Yet, looking ahead to 2028 and the future of Iowa Democrats regaining their first-in-the-nation title back is still unclear.

"'What's important to me is there's no predetermined outcome in terms of what the calendar looks like,' Martin said. 'Everyone who wants to make a bid will have a fair shot and opportunity to actually make their case including Iowa.'

"Iowa Democrats lost their first-in-the-nation caucuses back in 2024 and have since asked Iowans to fill out a survey asking what they should for 2028 if Iowa is once again left out of the early presidential nominating calendar.

"Martin said him [sic] and the DNC Rules and Bylaws committee, who chooses the order of the calendar, will be looking for states that can test their nominees, is fair and cost efficient."

--

Noteworthy: Look, there is not that much here. Tallal's is a story that mainly highlights Democratic efforts from the top down to compete in Iowa in the 2026 midterms. There just is not that much about the calendar, Iowa's place in it and 2028. However, Martin continues to repeat what has been a drumbeat out of the national party concerning its process to select states to fill out the early calendar in the coming presidential cycle. And while the oft-used line about Iowa having the same chance as any other state petitioning the national party to go early in 2028 continues to be trotted out, leaving the door open to Iowa's inclusion in the early window, other signals have been more ominous for Democrats in the Hawkeye state. The scheduling and/or sanctioning of their delegate selection -- be it caucus or party-run primary -- is still months away while the available evidence points toward not being included in the states granted a waiver by the party to go early. 

"Democratic Calendar in Disarray: The Importance of the 2028 Presidential Primary Schedule"

Nick Field, writing at Larry Sabato's Crystal Ball, looks at some of the questions facing Democrats as they set out to put together an early calendar lineup for 2028:

"[T]he primary calendar is now under the purview of the DNC’s Rules and Bylaws Committee. Martin has reshaped this critical committee, as 32 of its 49 members are new, with Martin ousting some party power brokers who haven’t been shy in making their displeasure known far and wide. According to what Martin told Favreau, the committee won’t release their proposed calendar until the winter of 2027...

"Top of the agenda for the group is bound to be whether New Hampshire leads the pack again or South Carolina now assumes that role. There’s also the question of Nevada, and whether any other states can join the pre-Super Tuesday portion of the calendar. This trio of states is set to get two seats each on the Rules and Bylaws Committee, perhaps an indication that none of them will be dropped from the early window.

"All of these scheduling questions could ultimately prove pivotal for the potential 2028 candidates."

--

Noteworthy: Perhaps this is one of those cases in which a headline writer was overly playful with an often over-expressed notion -- Dems in disarray -- that does not exactly match the tenor of the piece. However, having written for Crystal Ball a few times over the years, my experience was that the author came up with them. Regardless of whether it was used tongue-in-cheek or seriously, I just do not see that much disarray with the Democrats and their 2028 calendar. 

That is, not yet anyway. 

Look, if used seriously in the context of Nick Field's piece, the usual thicket of rules that the two major parties, but especially the out-party, faces every four years can be confused for disarray. But I don't think it is disarray at this point. After all, Democrats on the Rules and Bylaws Committee (RBC) are literally at the beginning of what is likely to be a lengthy process. Everything is seemingly on the table. 

But as this process progresses and we learn more about how state parties will be able to pitch their primaries or caucuses to the RBC and the new members of the panel get the historical context of the rules and the rules-making process that staff quadrennially provides, that aforementioned everything will winnow down to a much smaller, actually feasible, set of options from which the committee will ultimately choose in the next 18 months.

And no, none of this necessarily portends big changes to the early calendar for 2028. But yes, the New Hampshire question will be among the more prominent ones the RBC will have to tackle.

--

There is more in there to respond to, but I will save that for something over at FHQ Plus, where I have a bit more space to address things.

In the meantime, here is where the 2028 primary calendar currently stands.

"Should Iowa Democrats go 'rogue' and go first with 2028 caucuses? Survey seeks party input"

Brianne Pfannenstiel at The Des Moines Register digs in on where Iowa Democrats are with the 2028 presidential primary calendar process at the starting line:

"As national Democrats begin gearing up for a conversation about the 2028 presidential nominating calendar, Iowa Democrats are asking themselves whether they want to obey the national party’s process or go 'rogue' with a renewed push for first-in-the-nation status.

"In a new survey set released to Iowa Democrats Thursday, Aug. 21, Iowa Democratic Party Chair Rita Hart writes that although the party’s focus is on winning elections in 2026, 'discussions about the 2028 nominating process have begun.'

“'Without an incumbent president on the ballot, we are likely to have one of the deepest and longest nominating campaigns in history,' she wrote in the survey introduction. 'Unlike 2024, the outcome of the presidential nominating process will be in doubt. As Iowa Democrats, we have choices to make about how to proceed.'”

--

Noteworthy: Chair Hart struck a pragmatic tone at the outset of the national party's calendar deliberations. While the survey teases the idea that Hawkeye state Democrats may go rogue for 2028, Hart pointed out that 1) it is still much too early and 2) there are a lot of moving parts that will affect what the state party may do with regard to the caucuses next time around, including how the party performs in state contests during the 2026 midterms. 

Others within the party were much more forceful, recently removed DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee member (and Iowa national committeeman) Scott Brennan among them. "Full speed ahead and damn the DNC," he said, striking a defiant posture. 

Of course, Iowa Democrats can be defiant without actually breaking any likely DNC rules for 2028. One should expect the state party to hold early caucuses again during the next cycle. It is, after all, state law. What those early -- January? February? -- caucuses do, however, matters. If they merely select delegates to go to the next step of the caucus/convention process as was the case for the 2024 cycle, then Iowa Democrats will not have held their "first determining step," as the DNC calls it, and will be rules-compliant. 

What matters is not that preliminary selection process. The part that will be and always has been important, not to mention determinative, is the allocation process. If the results of any caucus vote determines which candidates win how ever many delegate slots -- allocation -- then such a caucus would run afoul of DNC rules. 

And it is worth raising another reality: Now that Iowa Democrats have held a mail-in party-run presidential primary, it will be hard for the state party to make the case for returning to the in-person caucuses alone, rogue or not. That is a much more difficult argument to make before the national party and to rank-and-file Democrats in the Hawkeye state. 

--

Related at FHQ+:

Background on 2023 state law change and the implications for Iowa Democrats

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More:

Iowa Capital Dispatch: Iowa Democrats launch survey, discussion on future of presidential caucuses

Associated Press: Iowa Democrats consider bringing back lead off caucuses, even if it means going ‘rogue’ in 2028

"Inside the Dems' fight to be 'the new Iowa' and hold the first 2028 primary"

Alex Thompson at Axios pulls back the curtain on the beginning of the Democrats' process to set the 2028 early calendar :

"Democratic Party officials are quietly battling over which state will be the first to vote in the 2028 presidential primary — a fight that's set to break into the open next week, when the officials meet in Minneapolis.

"Nevada, New Hampshire, and Michigan are currently the frontrunners to be 'the new Iowa,' and lead off the 2028 Democratic primary season, according to several people familiar with the Rules and Bylaws committee that will determine the order."

--

Noteworthy: First of all, I don't know how much "fight[ing]" or "battling" there is over the calendar at this point. As Thompson notes much further on in the story than was probably necessary, the process is at the starting line. If there are fights now, then that portends a likely ugly process. It won't be. It will be politics as it usually is. State parties will jockey for early spots, candidates will push their preferences (directly or through proxies/supporters on the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee and those members of the panel will have their own opinions as well. There will be some push and pull, and things may get heated along the way -- they probably won't (although it may be reported that way) -- but the calendar is a collective action problem the party's new (as of the 2024 cycle) process has already resolved once. 

As for "the new Iowa," well, Michigan was already the new Iowa in 2024. The Great Lakes state became the midwestern state in the early window. And, yes, South Carolina was the new first (sanctioned) state in the process as well. Would Nevada, New Hampshire and Michigan not be vying to be the new South Carolina? 

And finally, this passage from Thompson's piece merits a response:

"For decades, Iowa's caucuses and New Hampshire's primary kicked off the presidential primary season.

"But the order of contests has become a free-for-all since Iowa botched its caucuses in 2020, and then-President Biden changed the calendar in 2024 to favor his re-election bid by moving up the primary in Biden-friendly South Carolina."

I don't know that Iowa's caucus experience in 2020 triggered the reexamination of the calendar. It was a part of it, but the DNC was already moving in the direction of diversifying the early calendar and opening the process up for 2024. The party voluntarily moved toward an orderly process -- not a free-for-all -- whereby Iowa and New Hampshire (and Nevada and South Carolina) no longer received (near) automatic waivers to hold early contests. Rather, all state parties -- those that wanted to anyway -- could pitch the party on being early. 

And then as now, the early favorites to win those slots were states that were mostly already early. That's the story here: that Nevada, New Hampshire and Michigan are the states being talked about now as the possible first Democratic primary state for 2028. All were granted early spots during the last cycle.

Bottom line: there is a long way to go, folks.

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More on the 2028 presidential primary calendar here and here.

"DNC chair says Democrats will start process of setting 2028 primary calendar this month"

Sarah Fortinsky at the The Hill summarizes DNC Chair Ken Martin's comments on the 2028 Democratic primary calendar:

"Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chair Ken Martin said on Sunday that the party will begin deliberating the 2028 primary calendar later this month at a meeting in Minneapolis.

"'We’re going to start that conversation actually this month in August at our DNC meeting in Minneapolis,' Martin said in an interview on NewsNation’s 'The Hill Sunday,' when host Chris Stirewalt asked about the primary calendar in the next president election.

"'The Rules and Bylaws Committee, which is newly composed, will start this conversation by putting forward the rules and procedures, and start to really figure out how we’re going to engage in this,' he continued.

"Martin said the process will play out over the next year, and he expects to have a calendar set by the end of next year."

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Noteworthy: The rough timeline here suggests that the DNC will carry over some elements of the process from the 2024 cycle. That the final calendar decisions at the national party level did not come down until not only after the 2022 midterms but in December of that year was a break from the protocol the party had utilized in most previous post-reform cycles. Usually, those early window calendar slots were settled on in the late summer/early fall of the midterm year alongside the formal final adoption of the entire rules package for the upcoming presidential nomination process. 

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More from FHQ Plus (subscription):

DNC Chair Martin lays out early state checklist for 2028

"South Carolina Democrats will fight to keep 'first in the nation' primary status in 2028"

Alexandra Marquez weighs in at NBC News on the uncertainty of the early 2028 primary calendar for Democrats:

"Three years before 2028, the outlines of the next presidential race are already growing clearer, with large fields of potential primary candidates in both parties already making early moves.

"But one big thing is very much unclear for Democrats: which state will vote first when the primaries start."

...

"In South Carolina, which was tapped to host the Democrats’ first sanctioned primary for the first time in 2024, state Democrats are adamant they will be first in line on the primary calendar again in 2028.

"'Oh yeah, we’re first,' South Carolina Democratic Party Chair Christale Spain told NBC News at the party’s headquarters in Columbia earlier this month. She added, 'South Carolina is first. That means the South is first. So we’re gonna continue to fight for that.'"

--

Noteworthy: Early reporting on the South Carolina angle of the 2028 primary calendar story has come to lean so heavily on comments from Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-SC, 6th) that they have almost become conventional wisdom:

"Clyburn told reporters at his annual fish fry he’s not concerned about South Carolina being the lead off contest, after the Democratic Party kicked off its 2024 presidential nominating process with the Palmetto State.

“'I never asked for anything more than keep us in the pre-primary window which covers a whole month before the primary starts,' Clyburn said. 'So I think it’s important to the party for that to be the case. Whether it be one, two, three or four, I don’t care.'”

But the resulting picture -- a kind of "we're just glad to be here" sentiment -- is maybe a bit too deferential to Clyburn. There are other perspectives among state Democrats on the "should South Carolina be first?" discussion as Chair Spain demonstrates. 

However, would one expect her to say anything less at this stage of the process? Of course she is going to advocate for the Palmetto state going first in 2028. But this is the first break (of sorts) from that South Carolina conventional wisdom that has developed in the reporting on the primary calendar. 

"South Carolina's early state status is far from secure. But 2028 Dems are going anyway."

Note that the title of this piece changed from when it was first released via RSS. It is now published under the headline "Democrats in South Carolina are barely pretending they're not already running for president."

--

Politico's Brakkton Booker and Elena Schneider report on prospective 2028 Democrats' travel to traditional early states (and shuffling the calendar moving forward):

"South Carolina Democrats know their grip on the top spot is tenuous, with traditional early states like Iowa and New Hampshire eager to reclaim their lead-off position, and others — like North Carolina and Georgia — seeking to emerge as new states to consider. And it comes as there’s been a major reshuffling on a powerful panel at the Democratic National Committee that has huge sway over the presidential nominating process."

...

"But moving the order of primary states is easier said than done. North Carolina is hamstrung by state law from moving its date, and Democrats would need the GOP-controlled legislature to agree to any changes. DNC members have also emphasized smaller states to allow lesser-known candidates to build followings.

“'The most powerful force in the universe is inertia, so South Carolina is probably the favorite to stay just because of that,' said an incoming member of the committee granted anonymity to discuss internal dynamics. 'Every state has a chance to be first, but I do think we have to come into this with a degree of realism.'”

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Noteworthy: In 2022 the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee (DNCRBC) had a short checklist for states vying for one of the several early calendar slots for 2024:

• Diversity
• Competitiveness
• Feasibility

The first two, to be sure, were and are more than aspirational or symbolic. Diversity of the Democratic primary electorate in a given (prospective early) state was always important to the DNCRBC when the calendar decisions were made in 2022. General election competitiveness was less so. Both paled in comparison to the unavoidable third item on the list: feasibility. A state cannot be early if decision makers cannot get a date change made. That is all the more difficult when 1) Republicans control all of some of the levers of power in state government (whether governor, secretary of state or state legislature) and/or 2) there is no Republican buy-in at the state and/or national level. And conversations between Democrats and Republicans at the national, much less the state, level are not apparent at this time ahead of decisions on the 2028 calendar. 

It is early yet for 2028, and those conversations can happen at any time, but there is no evidence they have or are in the offing at this point. And that is food for thought as the media treatments of this topic gain steam. Feasibility matters.

"[I]t seems that New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada will remain early"

CNN's Zachary Wolf and Isaac Dovere recently chatted about the 2028 Democratic presidential nomination:

"What are the early states to watch?

"WOLF: Biden forced a lot of changes in the primary process for Democrats, including Iowa not really being an early state for them anymore. What’s the early map going to look like?

"DOVERE: Biden did push through some changes, especially making South Carolina first. But some of the other changes, particularly moving Iowa off of the early-state calendar, were very much supported by a lot of other people in the Democratic National Coalition. We’ll see what the calendar ends up looking like. The chances that Iowa gets back to a primary position seem very low. That said, the chances that New Hampshire gets back to the first-in-the-nation spot that actually is required by New Hampshire state law seem much higher.

"We won’t know the full answer on the calendar until at least sometime in 2026, and there is a lot of wrangling and back-and-forth among the states and among the DNC members. What is definitely true, though, is that no matter what arrangement will come, it seems that New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada will remain early. Where exactly they are is a little bit unclear."

--

Noteworthy: It is very early in the 2028 process, but at this juncture, FHQ agrees with Dovere's assessment. It does seem like Nevada, New Hampshire and South Carolina are "safe" in the early window for 2028. But again, the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee has yet to formally sit down to even begin the process of hearing pitches from state parties that want their state's primary or caucus included in the early lineup for 2028, much less actually settling on which states will fill those slots. That heavy lifting likely will not start taking place until after August and more likely toward the end of 2025/beginning of 2026. The early window for 2028 may ultimately come to look similar to 2020 (sans Iowa), but that is far from guaranteed this far out.

Sunday Series: Have the Democrats Actually Created Calendar Chaos for 2024 and Beyond?

There have been a number of stories written over the last several months about the calendar rules changes the Democratic National Committee adopted at its winter meeting in Philadelphia back in February. And a number of them find the space to add a footnote about 2028. That, and this is a paraphrase, if Biden runs against only token opposition, then the calendar changes may not mean a whole lot in 2024 and may not last beyond then.

With President Biden officially announcing his reelection bid this past week, stories of that ilk have forced their way back onto the printed page, virtual or otherwise. That includes the narrow genre of "forfeiting New Hampshire" stories but also some broader overviews of the calendar changes that lean heavily on the uncertainty -- if not CHAOS! -- created by the DNC changes.¹ Ben Jacobs had one such piece up at Vox in the wake of the president's announcement. 

First of all, let's clear the air. 2028 is a long way off. Much will happen between now and then. The events that occur will affect the next things that happen and so on. Yes, even all the way to 2028. It goes without saying, then, that this 2024 calendar trial run will have some impact on the rules that are ultimately adopted by the DNC for the 2028 cycle. But just how much impact?

After all, that is what 2024 is for Democrats: a trial run. It is a trial run that seems likely to occur under less than competitive conditions and offer little in the way of lessons that can be carried over into subsequent cycles. From a purely academic standpoint, the DNC is not going to learn much from moving South Carolina to the first position for 2024. Rules makers in the party will not be able to step back and say, for example, that the South Carolina primary was any more or less determinative in identifying a nominee in 2024 than it has been in the past. Now, that is not to say that there is not meaningful symbolism in the change at the top of the calendar, but rather, that the learning opportunities for the national party from the Iowa-for-South-Carolina swap in 2024 -- with the 2028 rules in mind -- are likely to be limited. 

But again, 2024 is a trial run and one that is unlikely to be completely devoid of learning opportunities for the national party. It is just that those chances will not come from how effective South Carolina was as a lead-off contest, or for that matter, what Michigan's primary would mean at the end of the pre-window period. Instead, the most learning will come from what has and is seemingly likely to dominate the stories of the Democratic nomination process at the outset in 2024: New Hampshire (and maybe Iowa) versus the DNC.

Penalties

Any lesson gleaned from the 2024 process, then, is much more likely to come from the penalties side than anywhere else. And the early signals are that those penalties -- and the DNC -- will get a fairly stern test from New Hampshire if not Iowa. Democrats from the Hawkeye and Granite states have been quick since the winter meeting vote (but also since the December DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee (DNCRBC) adoption of the changes) to cite state laws that tie their hands with respect to (timing) compliance with the new calendar. And that foreshadows some lengthy brinkmanship in the weeks and months ahead.

Of course, there will be exit ramps along the way. The DNC adoption of the calendar rules, however, probably forestalls any retreat by the national party in the near term. But Iowa and New Hampshire Democrats will have to submit draft delegate selection plans (DSPs) to the DNCRBC in spring 2023. Democrats in the Granite state already have ahead of the May 3 deadline this coming week. However, ultimately the state parties will have to have those DSPs approved (or rejected) by the DNCRBC in the summer or early fall. If one or both of the state parties formally defy the rules in those draft DSPs or leave the contest date blank in them -- the latter is the route New Hampshire Democrats have chosen -- then that likely entrenches both sides even further. It is soon after that point that the DNCRBC is likely to not only apply the delegate penalties -- an automatic 50 percent reduction -- but to up them to a full 100 percent reduction of the delegation.

The temptation then is to fast forward to January 2024 when New Hampshire (and maybe Iowa) potentially hold rogue contests despite those national party penalties. However, that would miss a key component of the rules changes for this cycle: candidate penalties or rather, the result of potential candidate penalties. The president has thrown his hat in the ring for the Democratic nomination, and his team has already signaled that he intends to abide by the rules the party Biden leads adopted for the 2024 process. Part of those rules include a prohibition on candidates campaigning in states with rogue primaries and caucuses. And part of the new and broader definition of "campaigning" for 2024 is filing to appear on the ballot in a rogue state. 

Iowa and New Hampshire have already acquired one asterisk in the Democratic presidential nomination process because neither is as diverse as the national Democratic electorate. But Biden not being on the ballot would add another asterisk to any results in 2024 and subsequently hover over consideration of the traditionally early pair as possible early calendar states in future cycles. 

And while that may be, the counter to all of that has always been that Iowa and New Hampshire do not really have that many delegates anyway. Wins in either, it has often been said, are more about the wins themselves and resulting momentum they generate than they are about the delegates accrued. True, but the flip side of that -- the rejoinder to the not that many delegates response -- is that Iowa and New Hampshire do not have that many delegates. 

What the DNC has really done for 2024 is create uncertainty for future cycles. Theirs has been a destabilizing action. Neither Iowa nor New Hampshire are delegate-rich. Both are already discounted contests. Furthermore, both would take some additional hit if they go rogue in 2024 and more so when the president (likely) does not file to appear on the ballot in one or both states.² Going rogue will, in turn, draw the ire of at least a portion of those among the DNC membership who will make future decisions on the calendar. [That says nothing of Iowa and/or New Hampshire laying the groundwork for some fringe candidate to win either or both rogue contests.]

If you are a prospective 2028 Democratic presidential candidate, are you going to be champing at the bit to get into the Granite state and start campaigning in 2026, for example? In some cases, yes! [Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) has already dropped in on the Granite state and plans to return next month.] It is a potential badge of honor to campaign against the national party establishment sometimes. That potentially carries with it some cachet that may move voters in and outside of New Hampshire (and/or Iowa). But it is not clear at this point that one candidate bucking the national party is going to start a rush into the Granite state given all the caveats above. 

Other deterrents 

The delegate penalties assessed on candidates by the national parties for campaigning in a rogue state are one thing that may buttress against that. But the history of the post-reform era has shown that there are other tools at the disposal of, if not the national party, then other early states. In fact, it was actors in Iowa and New Hampshire over the last half century who demonstrated the effectiveness of those alternative tools: pledges to boycott rogue states threatening the position of the early states.

Only, now the shoe is on the other foot, and it would be New Hampshire (and maybe Iowa) who are the threats and not the threatened in this and future cycles. What if South Carolina repeats as the DNC-sanctioned first state in 2028? Are candidates in a competitive 2028 field really going to snub Palmetto state Democrats to face voters in Iowa and New Hampshire? The better question is perhaps whether South Carolina Democrats will allow the candidates to campaign in rogue states without paying a price. That is what Iowa and New Hampshire have done over the years. They have used the protection of the DNC waiver (granting them early status) to effectively blackmail candidates. "Sign this pledge to stay out of that rogue state or you are done here (in Iowa or New Hampshire)." It has been a threat to kill a candidate's campaign before it really starts. 

That strategy has worked for the traditional early state duo in the past -- see 1996 or 2012 for a couple of examples -- and it can be used against them in the future (if they do not have sanctioned early status). And there is a strong argument that such efforts -- candidate pledges -- against Iowa and/or New Hampshire would be more effective because neither state is exactly reflective of the current Democratic primary electorate. One can imagine South Carolina Democrats, for example, asking candidates to sign a pledge to focus on the Palmetto state and the African Americans that make up the majority of the primary electorate there instead of spending any time in unrepresentative states like Iowa or New Hampshire. And it does not have to be just South Carolina. Nevada could be that first state. Any state that the DNC could feasibly get into the first slot in 2028 could utilize some variation on the candidate pledge that Iowa and New Hampshire have used in the past.

War of attrition

Now, if one is a prospective presidential aspirant for 2028, that is a lot to consider. Iowa and New Hampshire are already discounted in the Democratic nomination process. In the DNC rules for 2024, both have been knocked from the positions on the calendar each has held throughout the post-reform era. New Hampshire (and maybe Iowa) appear(s) likely to go rogue next year, which weakens the hand of Granite state Democrats (and potentially those from the Hawkeye state) in the resulting 2028 calendar rules discussions. Then there are penalties and potential pledges from/to officially sanctioned first states to consider in the next cycle.

From the candidate perspective, what is a win in New Hampshire (and/or Iowa) worth at that point? In other words, at what point does a contest become so discounted as to be next to meaningless? 

That is the long game the DNC is playing. The point -- the attempted point anyway -- is to discount any rogue state to the degree that is becomes meaningless to any (or most) prospective candidates. However, getting to that point hinges on the DNC doing something it has not done in the past: following through on the rules (and penalties) all the way through the national convention. 

Democrats in New Hampshire are banking on that happening again in 2024. That the DNC will cave, hand New Hampshire back its initial apportionment of delegates and seat them all at the national convention in the name of party unity. Yet, that is perhaps an uncritical view of the position the national party is in for the 2024 cycle. All of those past instances of threats to penalize Iowa and/or New Hampshire or to not seat their delegates at the national convention occurred in open and competitive nomination cycles. There was a greater need to not only demonstrate party unity to a viewing nation but to create it after fractious nomination processes. Caving was arguably more necessary.

But those are not the conditions of the 2024 cycle. President Biden is not running unopposed, but neither is he likely to face off against any viable alternatives. He and the national party under him have also orchestrated these changes to the rules for 2024, and it stands to reason that they -- and the national convention to nominate Biden -- would be more driven to see the rules through in order to establish (if not entrench) the new early calendar rotation. [Yes, New Hampshire is of some value to the Democratic coalition of states in the electoral college, but those four electoral votes are more expendable than, say, ten in Wisconsin, or 11 in Arizona or 16 in Georgia, to name a few other important states in that calculus. And yes, there are down-ballot implications too as mentioned in the footnotes.]

A cycle in which an incumbent is running for renomination and has instituted a new rules regime is maybe not the cycle to hope that the national party just caves again. 

Look, if some of the conditions of 2024 are unknown, then they are even more greatly unknown for 2028. Things could fall just right for an antiestablishment candidate, for instance, in the next cycle who could parlay a win in even a discounted rogue New Hampshire primary into something more. Still, that would be a very narrow path for a winning candidate to navigate through and become nominee given everything that continues to increasingly discount the contests in Iowa and New Hampshire within the Democratic presidential nomination process. 

But first thing first: The next step in this is how the DNCRBC reacts to the delegate selection plans from Iowa and New Hampshire when those deliberations commence over the next month or so. 

--

¹ Incidentally, the calendar changes for 2024 will likely create some rogue states, but they will be a different kind of rogue state that is less likely to plunge the system into chaos. Some unnecessary headaches, sure. But chaos? That will take a lot more than a rogue New Hampshire primary and/or Iowa caucus.

² "Some additional hit" is tough to define. In the context of New Hampshire in particular, the argument made there in the wake of national party calendar decisions has been that the Biden/DNC move to push the Granite state back in the order is only going to negatively affect Biden's chances in New Hampshire in the general election and hurt other New Hampshire Democrats down-ballot (but especially those holding federal office). It is a threat of mutually assured destruction -- from both sides. That will set off a battle to assign blame, the outcome of which is difficult to foresee.

--

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Rogue States Will Be the Norm as Long as the Parties Diverge on the Calendar

2024 is going to be different.

A look back to 2008

For the first time since the 2008 cycle, there will be a shake up to the beginning of the presidential primary calendar in 2024. And just as was the case fifteen years ago, it was the Democratic Party that instituted the changes. 

Then as now, the DNC sought to diversify the pre-window period on its calendar, augmenting the traditional Iowa/New Hampshire start with the addition of contests in two more states. Just as was the case during 2022, the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee (DNCRBC) invited state parties to pitch the panel in 2006 on why their state contest should be added to the early calendar in the upcoming primary season. Much of the focus centered on adding smaller states but also providing some balance in terms of region and demographics. And finally, part of the calculus also honed in on the idea of adding another caucus state in between Iowa and New Hampshire and another primary thereafter but before Super Tuesday. 

There are more than a few parallels between those criteria and the set used in 2022 by the current-day DNCRBC. But there are some differences as well. Democrats were the out-party in 2006, and parties in the White House tend to do less tinkering. Also, Democrats may have been a bit shrewder in their choices of additions for 2008. South Carolina was already a state that had carved out a spot in the early Republican calendar over the preceding quarter of a century. And Nevada was a caucus state at the time. Both featured state parties that made the primary/caucus scheduling decisions rather than state governments. Unlike in a situation where the state government sets a primary date, a move by national Democrats to add South Carolina and/or Nevada to their early calendar for 2008 did not necessarily drag Republicans in those states into the mix. 

Of course, Palmetto state Republicans already had a presidential primary that was an established part of the early Republican calendar. And Nevada Republicans joined the fun with January 2008 caucuses that skirted Republican National Committee (RNC) penalties. There was no RNC rule that required states in 2008 to bind national convention delegates based on a statewide presidential preference vote. Silver state Republicans and those in Iowa, for that matter, conducted a preference vote during precinct caucuses, but that had no direct bearing on the delegates chosen to attend the next stages of the caucus/convention process, nor ultimately those delegates who represented either state at the national convention. 

But it worked. Perhaps it was dumb luck, but it worked. Nevada and South Carolina, with minimal (although not nonexistent) implementation headaches, became not just established but institutionalized parts of the early calendar in both parties' processes. And that was despite the fact that both were flip-flopped in the other party's order; South Carolina third and Nevada fourth in the Republican process and the inverse on the Democratic side.

How 2024 is different and how that increases the odds of rogue states

That is a different story than the one that has played out in the lead up to when the latest primary calendar decisions were made in 2022-23. And it is different for a number of reasons. 

First, Democrats entered the review process for the 2024 rules and the primary calendar saying that no early calendar slots were guaranteed. All four (or five) were up for grabs. That meant that Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina had to make their cases before the DNCRBC just like every other interested state party. And for the first time since specific carve outs were added to the DNC rules for Iowa and New Hampshire for the 1984 cycle, Iowa, and likely New Hampshire, will have no waiver from the national party to be a part of the pre-window lineup. That necessarily creates two potential rogues states in one fell swoop.

Second, recall the background on the selection of South Carolina and Nevada in 2008. In both situations, it was state parties making the decisions on where primaries or caucuses in the Palmetto and Silver states ended up on the calendar. South Carolina obviously remains the same as it was in 2008 (with respect to the decision makers). That is part of the reason South Carolina Democrats got the nod to go first for 2024 in the Democratic process. Meanwhile, Nevada, under Democratic control in 2021, shifted from party-run caucuses to a state-run presidential primary. That move mirrors a push by the national party away from caucuses and toward state-run primaries. 

But while the national party has advocated for more state-run processes in order to maximize participation, that has limited the DNC's options in terms changing its calendar without potentially creating problems for Republicans in their process. Those problems are best highlighted by the Democrats' insertion of Michigan into the pre-window, an act that puts Michigan Republicans in the crosshairs of the RNC rules. Granted, this is a two-way street. The RNC decision to stick with the traditional Iowa-New Hampshire-South Carolina-Nevada lead off has impacted Democrats. It has created potential problems in Iowa and New Hampshire with both state parties, leaning on existing state, signaling they are likely to go rogue and hold contests concurrent with the Republican in their respective states. And unless the DNC tweaks its approach to Georgia, the Peach state primary will not be a part of the pre-window at all. Georgia definitely will not go on February 13 as planned.  

Another part of the 2024 picture that differs from 2008 comes from who is doing the rules tinkering. It is unusual for an in-party to so fundamentally reshape a seemingly ingrained part of the process. But what that points to is how much sway the incumbent president tends to hold over the system that will renominate him or her. Typically an incumbent is content to move forward with a nomination system that largely mimics the one that got him or her to the White House in the first place. That may produce changes from a nomination cycle to the renomination cycle, but they usually are not big changes. 

But what if they were? The 2024 cycle is testing that. It is the incumbent president who is testing that. Indeed, without the input of the president on the 2024 primary calendar, the DNCRBC seemed to be heading in the direction of something that would have knocked Iowa out altogether, bumped the other three early states up a notch (maybe with some additional shuffling) and added Michigan to the end of the pre-window as a midwestern replacement for the caucuses in the Hawkeye state. President Biden had something else in mind and the DNCRCB and ultimately the full DNC fell in line. 

And that has implications for both parties' calendars. More importantly, that has implications for how orderly those calendars are in coming together. Questions remain on both sides. 

Finally, while all of the above seemingly points the finger squarely at the Democrats as instigators in all of this, Republicans have played a role as well. Necessity is the mother of invention and, in fact, brought the national parties together in the time after the chaos of the 2008 calendar. Both saw value in not starting the process in January (or for not allowing states other than the first four to conduct contests in February). And they informally brokered a deal. FHQ often cites that and uses the "informally brokered" language, but here is what that meant in the rules. 

In the amended rules for the 2012 cycle, the RNC added language that created a specific carve out in Rule 15(b)(1) for Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina. In the previous cycle (2008), only New Hampshire and South Carolina had those exemptions. [Iowa and Nevada did not need them. Neither allocated any national convention delegates to the national convention in their precinct caucuses.] That aligned the Republicans with the Democratic pre-window calendar for the most part. Again, recall the South Carolina/Nevada flip-flop between the parties.

Moreover, the RNC added one other rule, Rule 15(b)(3):

If the Democratic National Committee fails to adhere to a presidential primary schedule with the dates set forth in Rule 15(b)(1) of these Rules (February 1 and first Tuesday in March), then Rule 15(b) shall revert to the Rules as adopted by the 2008 Republican National Convention.

It is not common for one party's nomination rules to cite the other party. But for 2012, the basic outline of the Republican calendar hinged on what national Democrats did. Basically, if the DNC did not adopt rules that called for a February 1 start to the calendar for the early states and a first Tuesday in March start for every other state, then the RNC would revert to the rules it used in 2008. That would have snapped back to the RNC using a calendar that allowed all but the exempt states to start in February pushing Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada into January. Yes, that happened anyway because Florida broke the rules again in 2012. But that was not a function of this brokered deal between the parties. It was because the RNC penalties were not severe enough.

However, once the RNC got their penalties right in 2016 with the addition of the super penalty, that was it. That was the high-water mark for cooperation between the parties. And the agreement held through the 2020 cycle or until the Democrats walked away for 2024. 

The break was about more than just the Democrats going their own way with a fundamentally different early calendar lineup for 2024. The truth is there was not much for them to walk away from. The dialog that had developed out of that deal brokered fifteen years ago gradually declined over time. It happens. And it happened because the players involved changed. Leadership on the RNC Rules Committee changed again in 2017 and interest on the Republican side mostly died with it. There was still Republican interest in the dialog but it was no longer coming from players who were directly involved on the RNC Rules Committee. 

And that lack of communication was something DNCRBC co-Chair Jim Roosevelt noted in the December meeting when the 2024 calendar plan was initially adopted by the panel. In responding to concerns from Scott Brennan, Iowa DNC and DNCRBC member, about the potential for a split between the two national parties on Iowa's calendar position leading to chaos, Roosevelt said that the Republicans were not open to coordinating this time. And that has been true for the last two cycles.

That matters. It is a part of the fuller picture. And as long as there is no (even informal) coordination on the matter between the two national parties, the more there are going to be rogue state situations like the ones that are likely to mark the 2024 cycle in Iowa, Michigan and New Hampshire (if not Georgia).

But what even is a rogue state?

If Iowa or Michigan or New Hampshire are rogue in 2024 in one party's process or another, then that is different from the calendar rogues of the recent past. Those three states are unlike Florida and Michigan in 2008 and unlike Arizona, Florida and Michigan in 2012. State actors in Arizona, Florida and Michigan made decisions to break the rules. State laws were changed ahead of 2008 to push Florida and Michigan into noncompliance, and they were not changed before 2012 to comply with the new (and later) calendar start codified in both parties' rules for that cycle. 

Contrast that with the situations in Iowa, Michigan and New Hampshire for 2024. Republicans in Iowa and New Hampshire and Democrats in Michigan all have the blessings of their national parties to conduct early contests next year. Their counterparts across the aisle do not. And in the case of Michigan Republicans and New Hampshire Democrats, they have no real recourse if they want to use the state-run primary. If partisans on the other side move or keep the primaries where they are under state law, they are stuck to a large degree. 

That is a different kind of rogue. That is a rogue that is created by the discrepancy between the two national parties' presidential primary calendars. It forces the state parties in that situation to either take the penalties or to pay for their own party-run process (which is a penalty in its own right). But as long as the calendar divide exists -- and especially if Democrats continue to reexamine and reshuffle their early calendar lineup -- then this type of rogue state is likely to continue to cause problems on one side or the other. And that says nothing of the possibility of Republicans following suit and shuffling their early calendar in cycles to come. 

As of now, there is little evidence that there is any movement from other states to go rogue in the old fashion. In West Virginia, there are bills to create a separate presidential primary and schedule it for February, out of compliance with both parties' rules. But that is it. There is no concerted effort to rush the gates and go early against the rules. However, just because there is no conventional rogue activity now, or even in this cycle, it does not mean that states will not try to exploit the calendar differences between the two national parties in the futures should they persist. 

It is that sort of unraveling of the steady state informally coordinated between the national parties a decade and a half ago that should trouble decision makers on the national level.

--

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Raffensperger Weighs in on Early Georgia Presidential Primary

For the first time since the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee (DNCRBC) officially elevated Georgia in the discussions of early presidential primary states in December, Peach state Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) has publicly shared his thoughts. 

As the AP's Bill Barrow reports, Raffensperger likes the idea: 

“Georgia would be a great early primary state in 2028. It has a good cross-section of engaged voters from both parties."

And therein lies the rub. Georgia's fate on the Democratic calendar for 2024 remains unresolved and state Democrats have until June 3, 2023 to find a fix in order receive a pre-window waiver from the national party. But the problem is that the two national parties' calendars are misaligned more than usual for 2024. The RNC voted in April 2022 on amendments to the 2024 presidential nomination rules and opted to stick with the early calendar the party has used every cycle since 2008. 

That leaves Georgia on the outside looking in on that side of the equation. Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada will once again be the four early states in the Republican process, and the national party now has no means of changing it. All rules changes had to be made by September 30, 2022. But once amendments were adopted by the national party last April, that was it. There is nothing the RNC can do at this point to change its calendar.

But as Raffensperger noted in his brief comments, things could be different for the Peach state when planning for 2028 commences. 

However, an early position in 2024 is still not necessarily out of the question for Georgia. There is just very little wiggle room at this point. The rules are locked in. But Raffensperger's office has set the criteria for cooperation from their office on the primary scheduling matter. In reaction to the DNCRBC calendar vote in December, Jordan Fuchs, deputy secretary of state set the parameters:

"We’ve been clear: This needs to be equitable so that no one loses a single delegate and needs to take place on the same day to save taxpayer funds."

Georgia can hold a single primary for both parties as early as March 1 under RNC rules. Any earlier than that and Republicans in the Peach state would be vulnerable to the RNC super penalty for timing violations. That would knock the Georgia delegation to the Milwaukee convention down to just twelve delegates. 

Democrats' efforts to push the primary up to the February 13 position prescribed in the new DNC rules are likely to be futile given those penalties. And now that Michigan has passed legislation to move into its February 27 spot -- not to mention that the DNC has now also adopted its rules -- flipping Georgia and Michigan in the order seems out of the question. 

However, if the DNC is serious about nudging the Georgia primary into the pre-window and it does not mind a Michigan-and-then-Georgia pairing to close the pre-window, then perhaps the Georgia primary could fit into the space between the Michigan primary on February 27 and Super Tuesday on March 5.

Saturday, March 2 would work. 

However, wedging Georgia into that spot creates a potential spacing issue with the Michigan and Georgia contests so close together on top of Super Tuesday. That spacing is less consequential on the Democratic side if President Biden seeks reelection and faces only nominal opposition. 

But that still leaves the issue of how a primary on that date fits into the Republican calculus both nationally and in Georgia. Peach state Republicans, of which Raffensperger is one, may like the idea of the Georgia primary playing a role similar to what South Carolina's did in the Democratic process in 2020. From the same Saturday-before-Super-Tuesday position, the Palmetto state primary catapulted then-candidate Biden into Super Tuesday victorious. It is an outcome that has been viewed in retrospect as decisive. And that is not a bad spot in which to potentially be. 

Of course, that may not be the case in the Republican process and especially with a possible Michigan primary just a few days prior to a hypothetical March 2 Georgia primary. And that Michigan Republican primary on February 27 is "possible" because the Michigan GOP faces the same issue Georgia Republicans would encounter on February 13: penalties from the national party. Michigan Republicans may yet opt out of the state-run primary and hold later caucuses that comply with RNC rules. 

The RNC may also not be on board with any of this. Signaling a green light to a Georgia move -- again, within the rules -- to Saturday, March 2 may set off a race toward a Super Saturday among other states. And the national party may or may not want that complication. Granted, Raffensperger has under Georgia law until December 1 to set the date of the Georgia presidential primary. There is no rush. That may help mitigate some of the potential for a rush to March 2. 

Still, that is a lot of moving parts, not to mention the number of interested decision makers, to pull something like that off in such a narrow window. But at this point, if Georgia is to be a part of the pre-window on the Democratic side, then it may be March 2 or bust. 

Honestly, it always has been.

--

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OK. The DNC Has a New and Different Calendar for 2024. Now What?

The Democrats have a newly revamped set of calendar rules for 2024.

But as noted in this space a day ago, the adoption of those rules merely ends one chapter in the sequence and ushers in a new one. The national parties have now finalized their rules for the 2024 cycle, and now the ball in the court of the states, both state governments and state parties.¹ And they will react. They already are. State legislators have been filing legislation to change the dates of presidential primaries. Democratic state parties have, no doubt, been crafting draft delegate selection plans that will be released as winter transitions to spring 2023. And even on the Republican side, state party officer elections are and will be occurring and (delegation allocation) rules tweaks will be considered.

Much of this is and will be routine. 

Some of it will not be. Again, as noted a day ago on the heels of the DNC adoption of the new calendar rules package, the national party has followed a divergent path in the 2024 cycle to this point. And it is more than breaking with tradition and shunting Iowa and New Hampshire to later spots (in the rules) on the primary calendar than either has typically occupied. But that is where the focus will be in the coming weeks and months. And understandably so. As the Republican invisible primary heats up and candidates enter the race, there projects be a dearth of stories on the Democratic side. If Biden jumps back in, as expected, and receives only token opposition, then the only game in town will be the continuing calendar drama over Iowa and New Hampshire (and to a lesser degree, Georgia). News of the Biden campaign build out will certainly break, but the calendar drama will contrast with the picture of a party ostensibly united behind the president.

But one need not peer into the fog of a crystal ball to attempt to discern where this calendar kerfuffle is going. It has become clear that both sides -- the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and the state Democratic parties in Iowa and/or New Hampshire -- are going to dig in for a protracted battle. But that does not mean that news content creators and consumers need to fall into the trap of repeatedly checking the pulse of a predictable drama. 

Look, Iowa and New Hampshire Democrats will both have to submit draft delegate selection plans to the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee (DNCRBC) by May 3, 2023. The Iowa Democratic Party will definitely have the ability to specify a particular date on which their caucuses will occur in 2024. Whether the party actually does specify a date by that time or dodges and leaves that blank -- waiting, as has been the standard early state protocol, for the certainty of where other states may fall on the calendar -- remains to be seen. But two of the three possible outcomes point toward defiance. Leaving the date blank or planning for January caucuses (in order to stay ahead of other states) in the plan rather than falling in line under the new rules are not provable, positive steps toward compliance. 

The sequence is much the same for New Hampshire Democrats and their delegate selection plan. 

There is going to be defiance of the national party rules on the part of the Democratic parties in Iowa and/or New Hampshire or there will not be. And there will be a response from the DNCRBC. If defiance is the chosen path, then that reaction will not only be to strip both states of half their allotment of national convention delegates, but to remove the entire apportionment. 

This is pretty clear. ...right now.

It will not really be revelatory then in May (for Iowa) and June (when New Hampshire's waiver review concludes). It will not really be news. Yet, there are ways that the narrative can be pushed further that can benefit those following along with this story. Here are some questions that both news content creators and consumers can ask in the coming days, weeks and months of both entrenched interests in this seemingly inevitable back and forth.

Questions to ask now that there is an official outline for the 2024 presidential primary calendar

For both Iowa and New Hampshire Democrats:

What is the penalty for not following state law?

For New Hampshire Democrats:

Why can't the state party use a party-run option that complies with the DNC rules for 2024?

Both of these questions get to the heart of the typical defense in both Iowa and New Hampshire. Both parties use state law as a shield in their efforts to protect their respective first-in-the-nation statuses. Yes, there is a state law in Iowa that compels state parties to hold their precinct caucuses eight days before any other contest. And in New Hampshire the law calls for the state-run primary to be scheduled by the secretary of state for a time a week before any other similar contest. 

But what happens if either state party breaks those laws? 

The answer is clear in Iowa. Not much. No, it is less than that: nothing. There is clarity on that because both state parties have already broken that state law twice in the last four cycles. The caucuses were just five days before the New Hampshire primary in 2008.² And they were just seven days before them four years later. And never mind the fact that Louisiana held an early primary in 1996 that was before both Iowa and New Hampshire that year and also allocated a sizable chunk of their delegates.

What price did Iowa political parties pay in those years? None. In all cases, there was no state sanction, and the state parties were able to continue drawing most of the candidate attention and reap the usual benefits of being first. In Iowa's case, the state law is only as strong as the unified state parties standing behind it. If either or both fold, then the law is meaningless (with no penalties).

Things are slightly different in New Hampshire where the contest -- the presidential primary -- is a state-funded and run process. Unlike in Iowa, that ties the hands of the state parties in ways that one currently sees. New Hampshire Democrats are powerless to change the state law to alter either the primary date/scheduling mechanism or add no-excuse absentee voting. Republicans control the levers of power in the Granite state. 

But what is keeping New Hampshire Democrats from opting out of the presidential primary and turning to a party-run process that complies with the new national party rules? Again, as is the case in the Iowa example above, it is not clear that there is any significant roadblock to that sort of change. Well, there is an obstacle. In this case, it is the defense mechanism that is triggered in New Hampshire every time the primary's first-in-the-nation status is threatened. Very simply -- and clearly -- few in New Hampshire want to let that go. 

So, just as is the case in Iowa, the New Hampshire law is only as strong as the parties willing to band together and stand behind it. Any deviation in Granite state by either or both parties undermines the law for future cycles.

Of course, it is worth noting that while New Hampshire Democrats could opt to hold a party-run contest of some sort, it is not clear that taking such a route would allow them to keep their pre-window waiver. Recall that the conditions to be granted that waiver require New Hampshire Democrats to change state laws they cannot possibly alter from the minority. 

And that is another question to pose to New Hampshire Democrats: What would the party do if it did hold majorities in the General Court and the governor's mansion as well? That is a hypothetical that Democrats in the Granite state are saved from having to directly answer in this cycle due to the partisan realities in the state at the moment. But that answer would be enlightening. 

That said, there was a hint of an answer in the comments Donna Soucy, Democratic leader in the New Hampshire state Senate and DNC member, made in defense of the first-in-the-nation primary before the full DNC on Saturday. While she noted the futility of Democratic actions in the legislature, she did say that legislation addressing no-excuse absentee voting had been advanced in the last legislative session only to be vetoed by Governor Sununu (R). She went on to say that legislation was in the works or already out there to do the same in this current session. That is a good faith effort on the part of New Hampshire Democrats. That is a provable, positive step toward one of the changes they are being asked by the DNCRBC to make. The effort may be doomed, but it is evidence of Democrats in the state at least working toward the change called for in order to be granted a pre-window waiver. 

But if Democrats in the New Hampshire General Court can make those efforts on no-excuse absentee voting, then why not on changing the date and scheduling mechanism for the presidential primary? Soucy did not go there in her comments to the DNC. And that is a tell. There is no intention to make those changes. To do so is to undermine the current law which would weaken New Hampshire in these fights in the future. And honestly, it would be bad politics locally. No Democrat in the Granite state is going to hand that -- trying to change the first-in-the-nation law -- to Republicans on a silver platter. They just are not. They cannot. It would be a political loser for them.

In the end and in the context of the back and forth between New Hampshire and the DNC, that is not going to matter. All the DNCRBC is going to look at are the rules and whether New Hampshire Democrats have made good faith efforts at provable, positive steps toward the changes required to be granted a pre-window waiver. All of this -- for both Iowa and New Hampshire -- circles back to the fact that neither has a specific guaranteed waiver for the first time since 1980. That is a key difference in how the DNC will deal with both moving forward.

Speaking of the DNC, there are questions that the national party could be asked that can advance this story beyond a simple he said/she said drama as well.

For the DNC:

How is the party going to enforce this in the end if either or both states go rogue?

How does the party do that in a way that preserves the new system -- the rotation -- for future cycles?

These are more difficult questions to answer because they imagine a situation further on down the line once Iowa and New Hampshire have acted (or not acted). However, if one assumes defiance on the part of Democrats in both traditional kick-off states, then the answers become a little less murky. 

If Iowa and New Hampshire Democrats fail to demonstrate that provable, positive steps are being taken to comply with the national party rules, then as was mentioned above, it is likely that the DNCRBC follows its 2008 blueprint and strips Iowa and/or New Hampshire of all of their delegates. Those signals are already out there. The panel is already communicating that to state parties.

The conundrum, of course, is that while it may be comparatively easy for the DNCRBC to levy a full delegation penalty on both Iowa and New Hampshire during primary season, it is a different matter entirely to enforce that in a way that preserves the effectiveness of the penalties for future cycles. To do that -- to penalize the states in a way that lasts beyond 2024 -- the convention would likely have to opt not to seat delegations from either or both states. 

Perhaps it is enough for the party to send the same signal it did with Florida and Michigan in 2008. A intra-primary season penalty, though, may only serve to delay an inevitable clash until a time in which it is more difficult to deal: a competitive nomination cycle. The stakes are relatively low in 2024 with an incumbent president seemingly on the cusp of entering a race (that does not appear to be much of a race). 

If the national party and the president are serious about uprooting Iowa and New Hampshire and changing the way that the pre-window lineup is set every cycle, then it will have to grapple with how seriously they want to sanction both states for potential rules violations. To make the change -- to move to a quadrennial possibility of a rotation of states in the pre-window -- then it will likely require the convention to not seat delegations from offending states. And the convention is a distinct set of decision makers. It is not exactly the same as the DNC. There is some overlap, but not complete overlap between the two. But a presumptive nominee, and an incumbent president at that, does have some say in orchestrating any convention that nominates him or her. Biden would theoretically have some say in the matter if push comes to shove with Iowa and/or New Hampshire in the summer of 2024. 

But will he? Would Biden and those around him ultimately go as far as to not seat entire delegations elected/selected to those positions by contests that violated national party rules? That is the part that has proven difficult in the past and part of what Iowa and/or New Hampshire are banking on in the 2024 cycle. The president will not need either state to win the nomination at the convention, but a unified convention is what nominees and parties aim for if they can get it to kick off a general election run. That is what the early states would try to exploit. 

The question then becomes whether there is some middle ground that can deliver a punishment, the effects of which can be carried over to future cycles to preserve the new system the DNC is attempting to establish. Is there something less than not seating a rogue delegation that would also be effective? Seating those delegations, but stripping them of their voting rights on roll call? On other matters like the platform or convention rules? None are necessarily good looks for a party that bills itself as a defender of voting rights (even if the party is following the rules codified for the 2024 cycle). There is no easy fix that makes enforcement foolproof to a degree that likely fully delivers a message to would-be rogue states in future cycles. It is tough given the timing of things and the incentives at various points along the timeline. 

Finally, there is one more question that could be asked of the DNC but likely applies more generally:

Do any of the interested parties involved in this turn to the courts?

It is not clear that the DNC or the Biden reelection campaign would directly turn to the courts to seek a remedy to this. It is, after all, an internal party matter. But if done early enough, the courts could offer a path to compliance. Remember the 1984 experience. 

Mondale campaign operatives in Iowa took Iowa Democrats to court, fearful that Mondale supporters in the Hawkeye state would be materially harmed at the convention if the caucuses in 1984 were too early in violation of the DNC rules that cycle. Threats to not seat the delegation would have meant Iowa voices would have been left unrepresented at the convention. The problem for those who brought the suit was not that the claim lack merit of that the claimants lacked standing. Rather, the case came so late -- in late 1983 -- that other candidates/other campaigns had already built infrastructure as if Iowa's caucuses would be in the (technically) noncompliant position. 

But if a case came earlier in the year -- like after Iowa or New Hampshire submitted rogue delegate selection plans signaling their intent -- and if the case was brought in a year in which an incumbent president were running for reelection against token opposition (with little demonstrable campaign infrastructure in place), what then? Could the courts force on Iowa and/or New Hampshire Democratic parties remedial actions including party-run processes that comply with national party rules. 

The catch is finding anyone in Iowa or New Hampshire who is still a Biden supporter and who is legitimately concerned about themselves or their state's voice being fully heard at the Democratic National Convention. After yesterday's DNC vote on the calendar package, there may not be too many folks left who fit that category. 

Nonetheless, it is a questions worth asking. One that, when combined with the others above, advances what is likely to be a messy back and forth between the state parties and the DNC. There will be he said/she said drama to that mess, but it would be helpful to push beyond the temptation to regurgitate that story every painful step of the way. The questions posed here get at factors beyond that sort of superficial account. 

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¹ In truth, there is some overlap between these two phases. It does not neatly transition from one chapter to another. While most state governments wait until after the national party rules are set, some act before that point in the cycle. It is just that there is more legislative urgency on the issue of presidential primary scheduling, for example, in the lead up to the next presidential primary -- typically after a midterm election and before the presidential primaries commence -- than at other times. 

² Technically, the Iowa Republican caucuses were just two days before the caucuses that allocated two-thirds of national convention delegates in Wyoming that same year. 

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